If you use Firefox then you probably have installed add-ons for it to fulfill your specific need. These addons help to make our life a little bit more easier with their functions. I am writing this post with webmasters in my mind. I want to share my list of useful Firefox extension for webmasters:
Firebug: Firebug is the single most important tool that webmasters must have in firefox. Firebug is a collection of web development tools that are useful for webmasters. You get to see tools to debug websites that you have open in your browser window. You get to view the html, css and javascript of the current page. You will also be able to select the element of the page and edit it directly. You will get to edit the html, css and javascript and your changes can been seen instantly.
Additionally there are tools that you can add to firebug. I found the tools CSS Usage and Page Speed very useful. CSS Usage will allow you to scan and find out the parts of css that you do not use so that you can remove it and probably reduce the size of your css file allowing faster page loads.
Page Speed is another addon for firebug which will allow you to analyze the performance of a page. After scanning the page, it will suggest you different improvements you can make on your html, css, caching, javascript and images. These two tools will allow you to improve the overall performance of your website.
Fire Ftp: Fire Ftp is an FTP client for firefox. You will be able to add the ftp information of your websites to connect to your files directly from within firefox. Besides being able to upload and download your website files, you will be able to assign script editors so that you will be able to edit your website files using your favorite text editors like Notepad++ or Text Mate.
NoDoFollow: In your website, you have to ensure that you do not link to other websites just for the goal of passing pagerank. You want to be able to see which of the links you have in a page are rel=follow links and which are not. To do so, this plugin comes quite in handy. Just turn it on by right clicking on a page and all the outgoing links will be highlighted with different colors for dofollow and nofollow links.
Rank Checker: As a webmaster you will have to monitor your website ranks for certain keywords at search engines. This addon does exactly that. You will be able to add your website and a list of keywords. Then you will be able to scan and see where your pages rank over multiple search engine (Google, Yahoo and Bing). You will also be able to export your result as csv file or save your websites and keywords for future tracking. You have to understand that this tool is not available in the firefox addons website. So you will have to sign up in another website called seobook to install this tool.
ColorZilla: ColorZilla is a color picker tool for firefox. You can open webpages on your browser and using this tool, you will be able to pick and find out the colors of different elements present on a web page. The hex value of the color that you pick will be saved to your clipboard.
MeasureIt: MeasureIt is an addon for firefox and just like its name, this addon allows you to measure the width and height of different parts of your website. You will be given a tool that you can click and drag over the page and the pixel value of the selected rectangle will be shows to you. This tool comes quite in handy if you are trying to figure out and modify the dimensions of elements in your page.
As a final note on this topic, I would like to say that you should always disable the firefox addons that you do not use frequently. You can enable these webmaster addons when you require them so that your browser performs faster.
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