What are the "Must Have" extensions for Firefox

I'm not sure if you noticed that that site measured the impact of these add-ons "on how long it takes Firefox to start up". This obviously doesn't mean that browsing becomes slower! In the case of AdblockPlus the opposite is true: As a lot of ads are not downloaded, many sites load much faster.

 

vasa1 and tlu, thank you, I read too fast and failed to absorb that fact.

Acadia

 

FastestFox is #8 in the worst offenders list.

 

Palant has responded here (http://blog.mozilla.com/addons/2011/04/01/improving-add-on-performance/).

I don't use any ready-made list but those who do use one or more should be prepared for a slower start-up. In Palant's words:

The blog and the responses are worth a look!

Here's a response from one of the creators of one of the worst "offenders", Firebug:

 

I didn't know this!

Source: https://adblockplus.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=45296#p45296

If it's true then it could be one less esoteric extension required.

 

It's possible, but it's not the most easy-to-use tool for the job, I use HttpFox for that purpose.

But I use that feature to create my own blocklist, you'd be surprised by the number of tracking urls that aren't blocked by easylist and fanboy.

As for FlashGot(which was named on that thread), it's useful if you want to use a download manager, also it shows the size of video. And if you want it to have less impact on Fx startup, go to its options > Advanced > uncheck "Automatic download manager detection".

 

Quote: "Some more details on Mozilla's add-on performance measurements" :

https://adblockplus.org/blog/some-more-details-on-mozilla-s-add-on-performance-measurements

 

I don't think ABP can do a lot to change. It basically boils down to filters, and, human nature being what it is, more filters=better. EasyList has 11k and counting, and, as Sadeghi85 pointed out, ABP is still going to miss some. I doubt you can even filter out every single ad/tracker out there, as I doubt anyone knows just how many there are. If you add to the filters, you risk more performance loss, and you still miss things. If you subtract filters, you miss more, and worse, you risk upsetting your users. Either way, said users will just keep wanting you to add this and that to the filters.

 

You know, I've actually not run into any websites that have told me to allow ads or get lost for a long time. However, what I am running into under every browser so far that I've tested (FF4, IE 9, Chrome 11), is that the various ad-blockers under everything but Firefox, are killing page rendering. IE 9 rendering, after a few minutes of running smooth, just went down the tubes using TPLs from Fanboy (so far the only ad-blocking there really is for free in IE 9). Chrome 11 was doomed from the get-go, whether I used AdBlock for Chrome or even the "official" ABP that was forked over to Chrome. I even let them run outside of Sandboxie, as its newest version seems to slow those two browsers down as well, and no change.

I've tested, installed, reinstalled both browsers, and tested them for over a day, and the results have been the same. I'll sound like an FF fanboy, but truly in my case, Firefox performs the best out of the three with ad-blocking and just performs better period.

-Edit-

Hours after writing this post, I come into contact with a website that refuses to work with ABP. Live365 no longer allows you to listen with ABP, this seems to have changed overnight.

 

point on compression from the link: the way the extension is distributed is via a highly compressed .xpi file. In a non-rigorous study on Win7, compared to an totally uncompressed version, the highly compressed .xpi takes a bit more time whereas a minimally compressed .xpi is slightly better than the uncompressed.

 

I don't consider this a big problem. Yes, one should not use several filter list subscriptions that overlap to a large extent (like Easylist and Fanboy), but generally ABP has always been very fast, and the newer versions offer an even faster filter matching algorithm. (BTW: Wladimir had shown some time ago that filters using regular expressions are often slower than normal filters, and the major subscription lists have adapted since then.)

For the record, I'm using Easylist (with the supplement for my region) + EasyPrivacy, and I'm very happy with it.

BTW: The often very unsubstantiated rant against ABP has led to a very frustrated reaction of Wladimir. Very sad.

 

Not really surprised. And, working with users is a genuine PITA sometimes. No matter how little they know about the subject matter and no matter how much you explain them the reason why they should do this or that, they tend to stubbornly insist on their ways of doing things.

 

ABP needs to load 11k filters from easylist for example. Isnt that a bit overkill? When i look at the matches it found, mostly 90% or more of the filters arent used while i surf my usual websites.
ABP is probably coded to work very fast but with such huge filter lists (and some paranoid guys use many lists at same time) its no wonder it slows down startup times of Firefox.

 

Hmmm... http://adblockplus.org/blog/some-more-details-on-mozilla-s-add-on-performance-measurements

Also: http://adblockplus.org/blog/how-reliable-are-mozilla-s-performance-measurements

 

Yes, exactly. ABP is very fast in processing these filter lists. They used to be shorter in earlier times as they contained many complex regular expressions which are slower than simple filters, though - see here and here.

 

Very true, which is why people still have malware problems as well (though useability comes into play in security matters). It was a little pathetic to read where he offered to help out groups of people and they refused. Here's a bit of advice for people out there: If you're having issues, and the developer himself or herself contacts you, and offers to help you test the issues....do it you numbskull! There are enough devs out there who frankly don't give a damn and when you get one who does, jump on it.

 

I've found Fanboys lists to be more reliable myself. I use a handful of them and then just add my own as I go along. And, you're right, a good portion of those filters may never have one hit.

 

I use that list from fanboy too. I loaded a few hundred web-pages that i have and looked at the successful hits. I disabled the "zero" hits ones which were a lot. I'm not sure if the browsing is faster now, but i can imagine the CPU is reduced with this because it only needs to go trough a small list now.

 

I see ads in your future.

 

Same While it looks good on paper, life has taught me that the moment you get rid of something, thinking you won't ever need it, is the exact moment you'll need it.

 

Hehe this is only my test profile for Firefox. On my "normal" profile i use only NoScript as my ad blocker

 

Good news for all NoScript users:

 

Such comments would be more useful if the sites were mentioned. Otherwise, it could be misinterpreted for FUD.

 

One place that might have an issue with ad-blockers is PCWorld.com. If you go down their list of articles, and begin clicking the next pages, you may see what I see. After the second or third page of articles, the entire website is put in the background, and a blank, white pop-up appears with "Ok" and "Cancel". Pushing neither button takes what becomes a full page freeze away, nor can you get rid of the pop-up without leaving the site and coming back.

To give some insight into my set-up, I am using Firefox 4 with Fanboys ABP filters, and NoScript, with PCWorld allowed. Also Live365 will no longer work with ABP enabled either. It will load the website, but all streams are stuck in an endless loading attempt.

@InternetMeltDown: AdBlock is not a filter, but rather an extension into which filters such as Easylist and Fanboy are loaded.

 

If a site is Not properly displayed, then, an ABP user can
temporarily disable Only the particular Filter which is causing the trouble with the respective site.
There is No need to disable the entire ABP add-on.

By disabling one Filter at a time, it is easy to find which one is causing the trouble with the respective site.

When leaving the respective site, the ABP user will re-enable All Filters.