The Lazy Person's Copy & Paste

Dear Auto Copy,

Where have you been all my life?

When I was young and didn't know better, I had to:

HIGHLIGHT TEXT-> EDIT -> COPY -> EDIT -> PASTE.

Since I've gotten a little older, I've learn the virtues of:

HIGHLIGHT TEXT -> CTRL+C -> CTRL+V.

Now that you've come into my life, all I know is:

HIGHLIGHT TEXT -> CTRL+V

You've spoiled me from all other browsers and applications that can't seem to understand when I highlight a piece of text, 99% of the time, it means I want to copy and paste it somewhere else.

Thanks a lot, Auto Copy.

Less Clicking, More Time Saved!

...the continuing chronicles of a FireFox fangirl.

All right, I'm very well aware that I am becoming a FireFox fangirl with this blog. But I can't help it, Firefox is awesome with its multitude of helpful and time saving extensions. So once again, I have to sing my praises for a particular extension that's helped to save me from having a worn out click-finger. I would like to present to you....

Multi Links!
 

Gimme, gimme, show me the whole row!

I like to shop and I do a lot of my shopping online, especially the bargins and sales. Everything suddenly looks so much more interesting when it's on sale, right?  But the manic clicking involved takes the fun out of it. Going back and forth, clicking here, clicking there.  Even with the tabs that FireFox offers, there's still lots of clicking going on. Look, this whole row of shirts look interesting, can't I open ALL of them at once instead of clicking on the first one, then clicking back, then clicking on the second one, ad nauseum?

When you have Multi Links installed, it has the feel of real life shopping.

Highlight the whole row with my mouse (in green) and it detects the links (in red).

The individual pages open up for me as tabs, waiting for me to flip through each item. You're browsing through the tabs just like you're browsing through the racks.

All the pages are loaded...less clicking, less waiting for each page to load, get more reading done! :D

Sometimes I see a page that lists all the contests that I want to enter:

 
One swipe of my mouse and three tabs (one for each contest page) will open up instantaneously. 

Now I just have to cross my fingers and wish for luck!

What I like about this is I spend less time clicking here and clicking there. I click and highlight all the links I want opened, and they open simultaneously. With my DSL line, that means when I'm done looking at one tab, the other tabs are already there, waiting for me to read. If you ask me, this shouldn't be just a Firefox extension, the function should be built in. Download it here!


Happy browsing! :D

Photoshop!Fail vs. Picnik!Sucess

I have Photoshop!Fail. On the best of days, it makes my eyes cross. I have to sort of settle down and let it flow over me, breathe. My relationship with Photoshop, well, it's complicated. Sort of dread and hope all mixed together. Complex.

But what's the internet without nicely cropped pictures with texts and glittery stuff? Text. Like early 90's WordPerfect text. The F# keys...those were the days. Technically, do we still need the F# keys? I mean, the last I heard Google was getting rid of the CAPS LOCK, what do we need the F# keys for?

Wait, I'm getting off track here.

Pictures!

So I find this picture (and many more free pictures here)...

...and Picnik takes my picture out for a 2 minute party, 
and we end up making beautiful & cheesy music together.

Picnik is what Photoshop is if I can get to him it anytime I'm online. He It doesn't take forever to start up and paying attention to me. He It doesn't get cranky if I use other computer programs or browse the Internet, in fact, it encourages you to post that finished picture right on to your blog, twitter, what-have-you. He It doesn't require a commitment either, you can go to www.picnik.com, upload a picture from your computer or your flickr, Picasa, Facebook, whatev., and start the party without signing up--just save to your computer or post to your social network when you're done.

He It just knows me and knows what I want to do with my pictures: flaunt them, yeah! And the main benefit is, of course, that Picnik is a cake walk compared to Photoshop when you want to crop, resize, add effects, text, shapes, etc. It's made me question my relationship with Photoshop. Especially since the best browser ever with the best extension ever, Firefox, has an extension for Picnik, so you don't even have to go to the website, just right-click on a picture you want to edit, it will open Picnik for you along with the picture you want to edit. 

This is the polar opposite of Photoshop!Fail.  

This is Picnik!Success.

Right-click on a picture and you get Picnik functions for that picture.

Photoshop, it's still complicated. 

But I've got Picnik on my right-click.

Price Watch & Update Watch on Firefox

One of the best things about Firefox is its extensions, and I've discovered one so awesome that I'm going to start my inaugural post on it:

AlertBox

For watching prices on any website and for getting updates on websites without RSS...this is the best. I never have to check a store's website to see if the price went down, or check a website over and over to see if there's new content. Alertbox tells me when there's new content.

Compare to UpdateScanner, which is, I admit, a little easier to use, Alertbox is much more specific. UpdateScanner tells you if anything on a website has changed.  But usually, I only care about the price on a website, not about the banners, or the other text, JUST THE PRICE, mon ami!

So after you install Alertbox, you need to do a little something extra.  Highlight the price (or the date, or the post number, anything that will indicate new content), then right click, "add alert" and choose "For changes on clicked element".  Now your browser will work extra hard in the background, checking daily (or minutely, hourly, weekly, etc) to see if there any changes. Whenever there's a change, a little pop-up shows up at the corner, you click on it, and it tells you what's been changed. It save you time & money...and it's free.

ACK!  Price increase!

See when new contests are posted!

BEST EXTENSION EVER. 

Anyone want to see it in action? :D