Talk:Firefox/Feature Brainstorming

Opening a tab as a web page

How about including a feature that allows users to drag the tab into the start bar or something to open that tab in a new window.

Another tab feature I wish FIrefox had-its in IE. It allows you to click on a button and thumbnail images of all of your tabs that are open show up on one page. Or have a feature like in iTunes 7 where you can scroll through you album artwork-except with tabs. Why not both?

Strong support for an intelligent page-scroll!

Under "Text readability improvements", topic 2 (in the article of this Feature Brainstorming page) there is described a feature, I have missed for decades in all HTML-displaying software, including Firefox...

You all do know this: Reading a page over more than one screen leads to a last one, which contains any text-tail, not filling the screen completely. But here, whenever you page-down to this last screen, the end of the text is placed at the bottom of the screen, and therefore at the top there is more or less of text, displayed again. From there, you've lost the last line! From there, you always have to scan for this line, first...

This behavior is different from any other scrolling, and it's a drag in an ergonomical sense for the reader. I've never understood, why users didn't critize this, why programers didn't change this!

So, this feature in the way proposed seems to me overdue, really: "the previously visible area should be delimited by a frame/line for a certain period of time, after which the frame disappears or fades out, so it's easier to find the last read line." Or, similarily: simply show the last line of the previous screen at the top (for recognition, like an editor does), followed by the rest - and show an empty part beneath.

My suspicion is, that in the stone age, somebody had decided "Never screens with empty places at the bottom! Does no look good!", and from there on, all were imitating this - till nowadays. Imagine this crazy solution with a printed book: at the end of every chapter, the last page starts repeating text from the page before... maybe, pretty much lines (on average clearly half a page!), just to end with a last line, always exactly at the bottom place!

voodooyou

Downloading

I recently downloaded Firefox 2.0 and tried to download something. The "Open file with... isn't there and I have to save it first. I would like that option back.

i want to agree with that. you sould know it's passible to reactivate this feture by editing a config file, there are instractions on mozillazine fourms

Open

In IE it was wery good function: when you click on exe file you can open it witchout saving! IE sucks but it's have this! Why Firefox haven't got is?

Reintroduction of a Necessary feature

I don't know where to put this so I hope its ok that I put it here!

1. why can't you use Alt-Enter to access the properties of a bookmark?
2. I really like Firefox but I find that it is missing one key feature for me to transition from Mozilla 1.7.12 to Firefox 1.5.0.4, that is the lack of the same Mozilla "Bookmark This Group of Tabs" feature in Firefox. Now I know that Firefox has a "Bookmark All Tabs..." option but unlike Mozilla it creates a folder just like any other and has an option to "open in tabs" at the bottom of the folder. I can see why they did this and it would be nice to be able to enter a bookmark group to access only one tab... Yet it is something that is really rarely needed and could be done by hovering over the tab group for a short while. Now this might seam like a minor gripe considering all the other positives Firefox has over Mozilla, Yet I am truly addicted to the bookmark group in Mozilla and there are a few main reasons behind this:
   • it looks different than the other folders and is easy to distinguish
   • one simple click on the bookmark group to open it
   • The "Bookmark This Group of Tabs" defaults to show you the file tree (for lack of a better term) giving you a quicker way to save the bookmark group.
   Now I have been unable to find any extention that would allow me to use the same Mozilla bookmark group functions inside of Firefox. Is it possable that this could be included? Pretty please!

I REALLY would LOVE a solution to this Please help.... Thanks! -- UKPhoenix79 00:32, 3 November 2006 (PST)

When?

I know that the release of Firefox 2.0 has just happened but I can't wait to see the new advantages of Firefox 3.0 so when can we expect it? And by the way When and how will you tell us what features made the cut down? Carutsu 22:20, 4 November 2006 (PST)

They are planning on a release in late 2007.

Colors

Perhaps one could be able to change colors of the default theme without installing a new theme, and one could color code certain websites to a color to be displayed on a tab. Jimmy 15:22, 7 November 2006 (PST)

You could realize it by making the themes half-transparent and building in a feature to change the background color. Then you could even define different areas (for example one area for each button) and give to the users the possibility to change the color of every element of the theme. --Photon 00:45, 10 December 2006 (PST)

I think Firefox should use the features of the new Windows Aero graphics in Vista to make the browser transparent in some areas, that the user could choose, so say you could see your MS Word document and see the browser somewhat at the same time.

Identity management at browser level with OpenID

Current foreseen enhancements to identity management are only small tweaks. A real step ahead would be to include openID management at the browser level, as suggested in the comments here.

This would simply revolutionize everyone's identity online, since what all web sites are waiting for is just some sort of support similar to what Mozilla/Firefox could bring. Everyone's waiting for that, but just not doing it because of this lack of support.

It would really make life easier to both site owners and visitors.

Of course users should be able to switch identities from within the browser. Ultimately, that could mean not signing in anymore to any compatible web site as you would just do it once at the browser level.

NatC

Print what you see

I would like to see the feature print what you see in the print properties. How can I make that the new firefox has it? More info about my idea: http://wiki.mozilla.org/Firefox:Printing_what_you_see

Master Password and password security

Dear Firefox developers et al.,

I enjoy saving passwords, it makes my life a little less complicated, however I hate having them easily exposed by someone going to my preferences and being able to view them with relative ease.

It has come to my attention that the master password feature is ultimately useless, I presume that many people use a same or similar password for most of their user accounts and that the master password STILL requires a password to be entered simply to allow someone to have it inputed automatically.

My suggestion is to have a security center password which is required to view/delete/add saved passwords. Passwords that are saved are accessible without the need for entering a master one when viewing such a page. The saved passwords function as they would without a master password, the only change being as far as viewing them, adding them, and deleting them.

The master password idea is good but for now I cannot save passwords because either the security risk is too great or the hassle (because I still need to enter a pw) is too great.

This site is also somewhat difficult to come by, my apologies in advance for posting in the wrong location.

Please return the spirit of the saved password to its rightful place so I may once again browse 100% happy.

Extensions Resource Tracking - enhancing comment

I'm new here. Hopefully this is OK. This is an addition of a point already present in the list

I propose to track both resources usage (memory, cache, time) and healthy statistics per-extension basis, for tuning purposes. Something like the Task Manager but for extensions, so if my FF is poorly responsive, I can track down the culprit extension.

Additionally, I'd like to know: a) wheather a crash (latest) was caused by an extension (and which one), enabling a crash-counter, and b) track installation date for every extension (more extension data: installation date, latest enabling and disabling, etc).

Finally, IMHO, a health-checker for extensions would be very useful, for example monitoring errors (as shown in the console). I would like to track what changes I see in my FF that were caused by each extension. Too much? Ok, then, I would like to know what changes an extension is about to do during installation, and optionally enable/disable the 'priviledges' of extensions, so I don't get surprises when installing extensions.

Hope these comments are useful! Daniel.

Mac resize thing should be transparent

On the mac version, the thing below the scrollbar that lets you resize the window should be transparent as it is in Safari. There should at least be an option to do this.

The Addressbar

The addressbar is the absolute heart* of the user's experience of a browser. It is also the most complicated, diverse and unpredictable, because of the richness of URLs and the necessity of a keyboard to adjust them. Of all the buttons, menus, extensions and other features, surely the addressbar is the one that it here to stay, however many Web 2.0-10.0 we get through? We are not yet at the point where we can navigate without it.

So I am amazed how little it has changed over the years. Then the excellent Locationbar^2 came along (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4014). What a creative idea! Locationbar simply must be incorporated into Firefox - it is a way that Firefox can once again set the agenda on the web.

Sadly I am devoid of ideas, but I want to ask the question, what else can we do to the addressbar to take advantage of it? A parser, to interpret segments and offer alternatives (from a look-up) to load? Right-clicking reveals a helpful context menu: download all media from this level; correct the spelling and reload, all in one; execute/download/give help on e.g. a php script?

(*apart from the content itself)

Close Button on the Right

I really miss in firefox 2.0.x the old close button to close your current tab that was located in firefox 1.5.x on the right. I find it really usefull and confortable because you don't have to change each time the area you click with your mouse to close your current tab.

Thank you for hearing my suggestion! What do you thing about?

• Although I like FF2's way of closing tabs, it does have its downsides, and many people do like the previous versions' way of closing tabs. I think users should have the freedom to close browsers both ways, if they please. --Armaetin 22:28, 9 April 2007 (PDT)
  • I thing it's a very good idea, that anybody could choose between the two interfaces, although i thing it would increase performance anyway just adding the close button on the right. It would be like an hybrid between the two previous firefox versions, if we keep the actual close buttons of each tab like firefox 2.0.x and we just add the close button on the right like like firefox 1.5.x. What do you thing about this idea? --Borgg 11:39, 10 April 2007
    • Here's a similar suggestion that some people might like. --Armaetin 10:17, 10 April 2007 (PDT)

Updating Feature Requests

Shouldn't we keep all feature request pages updated? What i mean is, isn't it a good idea to delete requests that have been implemented since they were initially posted? That way we can keep all the pages up to date and imo, render them more useful for developers who check them etc... ChaoticMind 06:28, 28 April 2007 (PDT)

• You could help do that. I clean up pages of its obsolete ideas sometimes because the admins/moderators do not appear to do that for us. --Armaetin 16:49, 28 April 2007 (PDT)