With
more than 64 million satisfied users at last count, the Firefox browser is
currently one of the biggest open-source success stories. And, like all
open-source projects, the code tree is still evolving and improving, as
developers from all over the planet contribute to the core engine.

Many
of these contributions are in the form of Firefox extensions, add-ons which
significantly enhance the browser’s capabilities. Some of the more popular
extensions include a news reader, mail notification, a weather forecaster and
an MP3 audio controller. All of these, and many more, can be freely downloaded
off the Firefox Web site.

In
this document, we highlight ten of the most interesting and useful extensions
currently available for Firefox. If you see something that strikes your
fancy…hey, just go ahead and download it!

1. ForecastFox

This
extension provides weather information for your location in the Firefox status
or tool bar. This information includes a radar image, current weather, and a
weather forecast for the next few days. It’s also possible to customize the
display with information on the current moon phase, sunrise and sunset times,
wind speed, humidity and other information.

 
 

2. StumbleUpon

The
StumbleUpon Firefox extension is an interface to
collaborative browsing: it lets you rate sites as your browse them, add
reviews, and view reviews submitted by other users. You can also browse sites
by categories, send your favorite pages to friends with a single click, or
invite others to view or review pages you’ve browsed.

 
 

3. GmailNotifier

This
extension checks your Gmail account and notifies you
if you have new mail (with a count of your unread mail messages in the Firefox
status bar). You can configure the refresh interval, and automatically browse
your Gmail mailbox by clicking the GmailNotifier icon.

 
 

4. FoxyTunes

Ever
wished you didn’t have to interrupt your browsing to control your CD player or
MP3 jukebox? Well, FoxyTunes has a solution—this
Firefox extension integrates a complete set of multimedia controls into your
Firefox status bar, allowing you to play, rewind, fast forward and pause tracks
without leaving the browser. Most common media players (including Windows Media
Player, WinAmp, iTunes and MusicMatch Jukebox) are supported.

 
 

5. ocd

This
extension queries a particular Web page repeatedly, alerting the user as
changes occur. The refresh interval is user-defined.

6. MeasureIt

This
extension makes it easy to measure the dimensions of any image on any Web page,
by providing a pullout on-screen ruler. Simply drag the measuring box until it
covers your image, and MeasureIt will display its width
and height in pixels. Great for Web developers who need to quickly check images
on a Web page.

 
 

7. Greasemonkey

This
powerful extension allows you to customize the appearance and behavior of any
Web site, through the use of client-side “user scripts”. A Greasemonkey script lets you change a Web site’s interface
so it’s more usable, automatically remove elements (such as ads or banner
images) from Web pages, import content from one Web site into another, or add
your own custom functionality to someone else’s Web application. A repository
of ready-made user scripts is also available online—you can use these, or just
write your own.

8. StockTicker

StockTicker lets you
track stock movements within your Firefox browser, by displaying the latest
stock price and changes in a Firefox toolbar or status bar. Color coding
provides fast visual notification of whether a stock is moving up or down, and
the ticker can be customized to retrieve stock information from a Web site of
your choice.

 
 

9. Sage

Sure,
Firefox lets you subscribe to RSS feeds with its “live bookmarks”.
But what if you want more? Turn to Sage, a full-featured (yet lightweight) RSS
and Atom feed aggregator that displays feeds and stories in the Firefox
sidebar. Selecting a story from the sidebar displays its contents in the main
browser window.

 
 

10. Google AdsenseNotifier

Feel
like keeping an eye on your AdSense earnings as you surf? The
Google AdsenseNotifier
tracks your AdSense page impressions, clicks and
earnings, refreshing itself at a user-specified interval to make sure that you
always have the latest figures at your fingertips. The filter criteria
currently available in the full AdSense application
are also available in this extension.