...this page. Read it through, if you’re interested. If you’re like most people, though, you’ll want to explore Firebird. So go ahead, poke around the menus and dialog boxes. I’ll be here when you come back.
Mozilla Firebird is a standalone browser based on the Mozilla Gecko rendering engine. The Gecko engine provides high support of web standards. See why web standards are important. Mozilla Firebird is also based on a new toolkit and was a spinoff of the Mozilla suite’s browser. Today, it will soon be replacing the old browser in the Mozilla suite in Mozilla 1.5. In this guide, I’ll be focusing on Windows, because I use Windows 98SE. Sorry for any inconvenience.
This mirror has Linux screenshots - just to be different.
Why you should use Mozilla Firebird; this site was designed by Ben Goodger and is very helpful to newcomers to Mozilla Firebird. Here’s why you shouldn’t use IE designed by ashitaka.
If you visit the project page, you will see a download link. However the text will most likely confuse you, and that’s what I’m here for. I would recommend either the 0.6 release or, an later build, 5-25. If you are uncomfortable with a .zip installation, try one of the .exe installers found here made by seb. You can
find more information about downloading a milestone/build here.
Open the folder that you saved it to. You should see a MozillaFirebird-*something*.zip. Unzip that into any folder (usually the programs folder on your computer). Now, in that folder, you should see another one that should be called "mozillafirebird". You can rename it to anything you like, because that’s the beauty of a zipped installation. Now, go in and create a shortcut of the MozillaFirebird.exe to your desktop. Now, click on that shortcut and watch as Mozilla Firebird loads!
This is perhaps the most important folder you’ll have to deal with.
It’s automatically generated when you run "MozillaFirebird.exe" and can
be found at different locations on different OSes. BTW,
"xxxxxxxx" is a string of eight random characters put in for safety
purposes and ".slt" stands for salt, which means random stuff in encryption.
What do the files in your profile directory do? You can find a comprehensive list of what files in the profile directory do here. Then, you can head on over to Mozilla Firebird Help: Tips and Tricks for loads of stuff you can do with the userContent.css and the userChrome.css files. You can even block Shockwave, Flash, and image ads by putting this highly effective code in your userContent.css.
Tip: Install the User File Editor extension aka chromEdit to easily edit these files, without the worry of knowing where your profile is.
When you startup Mozilla Firebird for the first time, you should see...
...this page. Read it through, if you’re interested. If you’re like most people, though, you’ll want to explore Firebird. So go ahead, poke around the menus and dialog boxes. I’ll be here when you come back.
Whatever you want to call them, we know they’re important to you, so the devs have created a very
powerful, easy to use bookmark manager. A picture is worth a thousand words:
How do you access it? Bookmarks->Manage
Bookmarks...
Right away, you’ll notice that your IE favourites are already imported! Cool, hmmm? If
it isn’t there, you can do it yourself manually.
Do you have Opera? Well, there’s a thread on how to import Opera bookmarks. You’ll need to download a third-party program, but it’s worth it. Sorry it can‘t be any easier.
Tabs- Such a powerful feature can be summarized into a single word: tabs. Not as complicated
as a MDI but yet more powerful than a single-window
interface. To open a tab, press Ctrl-T. To close a tab, click the small "X" on the tab bar or press Ctrl-W.
Right-click on a tab to access the context menu. Ctrl-clicking or middle-clicking (with your wheel/middle button) a
link will open that link up in many windows. Ever wanted to click a lot of links but not lose your
place? Now you can! Tabs can even open up in the background while you keep on reading
your original site! If that isn’t enough for you, try the Tabbrowser Extensions, which
literally does everything you want plus a whole lot more, designed by Piro.
Plugins- Firebird should recognize most plugins without a hitch. However, if you’re having problems, take a look at the Mozilla Firebird Plugin FAQ (Windows), Mozilla Firebird Plugin FAQ (Linux), and a warning about Flash.
Bookmark Keywords- You can set bookmarks to have a keyword. Then, every time you type in that keyword into the URL bar, you will go to that bookmark. Handy, eh? Let me show you how.
How this works: if you notice from the image, we have a “q=%s” after the URL. The “%s” is to be replaced by whatever you type after the keyword, in this case, “g”. Most search engines use “q” as the variable to search words, although it may vary. If you need more help in doing this, visit the MozillaZine Forums.
Search Field- If you notice in the customize menu, there is a search field for you to drag
and drop at your leisure. You can type in it and it will automatically search in Google. If
you click on the little magnifying glass, you select to also search from dmoz.org, a directory a websites. You can search hundreds more sites by
visiting the Mycroft Mozdev Project.
Customizing the Toolbar- Very simple to do. Right click the navigation toolbar and select Customize. Note: right-clicking some parts of the navigation toolbar might not bring up this context menu. You’ll get the following:
From there, it’s a matter of simple drag and drop. If you have used Mac OSX before, you’ll be familiar with this. Dragging a button from the box to the toolbar will place it there. Doing the reverse will remove the button. You can even drag around the buttons on the toolbar. These buttons may be placed on any bar, even the menu bar!
Keyboard Shortcuts Customization- a.k.a hotkeys; there’s no UI for doing this, but you’ll
have to manually do it yourself. You can see how it’s done at the Mozilla.org’s Customizing page. If you’re having
trouble, ask in the MozillaZine’s Firebird
General forum.
Javascript Console- Are you a Javascript web developer? Tired of those frustrating hard-to-find errors? Now they’re easily visible in a cool format when you go to Tools->Javascript Console. It’ll show you errors, warnings, and much much more! You can even clear away the log and start over again. What a versatile tool!
More features are described at the Mozilla Firebird Help Site.
Well, there’s the Tools-Options window. If you want a detailed analysis, check out here. If you want even more tweaking, type in about:config in your URL bar and hit Enter. Confused by how to use it? Visit here. Then head on over here to learn about what you can add to it. If you want more detail about a specific value, ask in the MozillaZine Forums. You’ll need to register (free), but it’s worth it.
This site won’t work!- Most of the time, the site is designed poorly, designed only for IE, or
doesn’t follow standards. Email the webmaster. Spread the word about web
standards.
Hey, why isn’t *anything tab-related* here?!- Download Tabbrowser Extensions. It
has everything and then some.
Firebird’s Too Sloooooooowwww- Try looking at optimizing your user.js file. The developers know about this and it’s going to be fixed as soon as Mozilla Firebird moves out of the pre-1.0 stage.
I installed the Flash plugin and everything’s screwed!- Look at this thread. A simple solution is to open all.js in Wordpad, and resave using the same filename. Do this before you install the plugin.
So you (hopefully) went through the list above and you are certain you have a valid bug. The next step is to go to Mozilla’s Bugzilla. There’s a search box in the middle of the page. Type in some keywords that might be the title of a bug that’s already been filed and might be the same bug as yours. Why do this? Because filing duplicated will just slow down the time the devs have to actually fix real bugs. Another option is to go the MozillaZine’s Firebird Bugs forum and ask there.
All of these can be found in the Extension Room. If not, I’ll provide
a helpful link, because I’m nice.
All in One Mouse Gestures- Provides customizable mouse gestures, rocker navigation, tab scrolling, and
history scrolling much like Opera’s except it has so much more.
Before asking in forums, etc. why don’t you check the extensions page here or see a brief list of most requested ones made by me here? Mouse gestures, anything tab related, more options, blocking ads, stylesheet switcher, calendar, google toolbar, smooth scrolling, user agent switching, etc. are all in extensions and explained in that list.
Mozilla Firebird Help- Covers a wide variety of topics; now the official project page.
MozillaZine- Late breaking news and forums.
A Newbie’s Guide to MozillaZine’s Forums- Must read for all newbies to MozillaZine Forums.
MozillaZine Forums- Tech support; general and offtopic chat; talk about Thunderbird, Firebird, Mozilla Suite (SeaMonkey), Other Distros, Themes, Extensions, and more!
MozillaNews Forums- Newbie section; talk about Thunderbird, Firebird, Mozilla Suite (SeaMonkey), Other Distros, Themes, and Extensions; brand new, not as much users as MozillaZine Forums.
Mozilla Firebird Features- Goes indepth on some of the topics covered here. A very good read with lots of screenshots.
I want to thank, so far, 
for mirroring this site and for sending out the correct MIME type: ‘application/xhtml+xml’. I also have put up a Brinkster site.