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Essential Pale Moon & Firefox Browser Add‑ons

Serge Y. Stroobandt

Copyright 2014–2019, licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA

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This page is still under construction.

Introduction

Do not track

Here is how to set Do Not Track from the menu: Edit > Preferences > Privacy > Tracking. However, Do Not Track can also be set from the about:config URI. As a matter of fact, about:config might be considered the preferred route, as more configuration variables need to be set to ensure privacy. (See below.)

Do Not Track

Do Not Track

about:config

Entering about:config in the address bar will bring up an interface for viewing and setting a wide variety of configuration variables, many of which are not otherwise accessible through the GUI. Take the vow of being careful and enter below key values in the search field. Double click to change boolean values.

about:config
key new value FF PM
browser.enable_automatic_image_resizing false
browser.search.showOneOffButtons false
browser.sessionstore.interval 1800000
canvas.poisondata true
network.standard-url.escape-utf8 false
privacy.donottrackheader.enabled true
privacy.trackingprotection.enabled true
security.dialog_enable_delay 0
social.* false or ''
view_source.editor.external true
view_source.editor.path gvim

Here are some more cool about:config tips.

Security

Security
icon add-on FF PM use
Belgium eID Belgium eID This Firefox add-on allows use of the Belgian electronic identity card (BeID) for authentication and signing purposes. Additionally requires eID middleware and a card reader driver (e.g. ACR38). Finally, you will also need to manually edit the trust settings of the Belgian Root Certificates in Firefox. Version 1.0.23 works correctly with Pale Moon.
Certificate Patrol Certificate Patrol Reveals when a HTTPS certificate has been updated, allowing one to check the legitimacy of this change.
Flashblock Flashblock Adobe Flash’s security record has caused several security experts to recommend to either not install Flash or to block it. Also Steve Jobs heavily criticised the security of Flash Player, noting that “Symantec recently highlighted Flash for having one of the worst security records in 2009.”
HTTPS Everywhere HTTPS Everywhere Encrypt the Web! Let Firefox automatically use HTTPS security on many sites. Certificates can optionally be checked by the EFF SSL Observatory.
Parental Controls Parental Controls MetaCert’s dynamic realtime, cloud-based content filtering system which adds many thousands of new pages every hour. MetaCert blocks 700+ million pages of pornography. That’s more than Norton, McAfee and OpenDNS combined!

Privacy

Without taking special precautions, one happens to be far less anonymous on the internet than presumed.

Privacy
icon add-on FF PM use
Adblock Latitude Adblock Latitude This is a direct fork of Adblock Plus made specifically for the Pale Moon browser.
µBlock µBlock µBlock is capable of blocking out almost all ads; including the ads on this site! It is reputedly more efficient on CPU and memory than Adblock Plus. Even more importantly, it is not disloyal to its users, unlike Adblock Plus which has repeatedly been reported to cheat on its users!
Crush Those Cookies Crush Those Cookies Get rid of a site’s cookies including its Adobe Flash (Local Shared Objects) from the moment the pertaining tab is closed. This happens to be the closest one can get to cookieless browsing without tedious micromanaging or breaking every other site. ATTENTION: Be sure to clear out the whitelist when you start out with this extension. Add-onsExtensionsSelf-Destructing CookiesPreferencesEdit WhitelistRemove All Sites
Self-Destructing Cookies Self-Destructing Cookies Get rid of a site’s cookies including its Adobe Flash (Local Shared Objects) from the moment the pertaining tab is closed. This happens to be the closest one can get to cookieless browsing without tedious micromanaging or breaking every other site. ATTENTION: Be sure to clear out the whitelist when you start out with this extension. Add-onsExtensionsSelf-Destructing CookiesPreferencesEdit WhitelistRemove All Sites
Flashblock Flashblock Selectively allowing Flash may prevent Adobe Flash cookies from being set during a browsing session.
Privacy Badger Privacy Badger A browser add-on of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) which stops advertisers and other third-party trackers from secretly tracking where you go and what pages you look at on the web. If an advertiser seems to be tracking you across multiple websites without your permission, Privacy Badger automatically blocks that advertiser from loading any more content in your browser. To the advertiser, it is as if you suddenly disappeared.
anonymoX anonymoX Restore your anonymity on the web and gain access to blocked or censored websites by tunnelling your IP-traffic through one of the many anonymoX proxy servers. As of recently, anonymoX started introducing ad popups on certain pages. So, use with caution and only when absolutely necesary!

Above-listed countermeasures are only partially effective. Every browser will share information about its configuration with the sites it visits. This implies that a browser is traceable to the point of its uniqueness. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) offers a free service to test the uniqueness of your browser configuration. For most of us, the results are sobering. If all you want is to be less traceable, use a “Private Browsing Window” in Firefox. However, if you care about privacy, assume that any system is compromised by default. To attain the highest amount of anonymity on the web currently available, use Tor from a Linux-based OS that is running from read-only media (e.g. a DVD) or a virtual machine (VM) environment that is known to be clean. The Tails GNU/Linux distribution will cater for these specific privacy needs. Also, use an internet access point that you usually do not use since all governments are tapping into ISP access records.

Power management

Power management
icon add-on FF PM use
Flashblock Flashblock Steve Jobs was right; Don’t let Adobe Flash eat your battery!

User interface

User interface
icon add-on FF PM use
Classic Theme Restorer Classic Theme Restorer Restores the user interface to the pre version 29 look with add-on bar.
Dark Backgrounds Switcher Dark Backgrounds Switcher Allows for night-time reading whilst preventing eye strain, melatonin deficiency and sleep disorders. At the flick of a button, this add-on will switch the background black and set the text colour to yellow or white.
GlobalFindBar GlobalFindBar Reverts findbar to pre version 25 behaviour; i.e. find terms are global over all tabs. Dedoimedo also explained this in more saucy words.
My CopyFixer My CopyFixer Use [Ctrl]+[C] when nothing is selected to copy the page title and URL in various formats. Requires Classic Theme Restorer.
It’s All Text! It’s All Text! (✓) This extension allows one to use his/her favourite text editor —like Vim for instance— to edit large text blocks in the browser. Version 1.9.2 works with Pale Moon.
Speed Dial Speed Dial Organise favourite websites in groups of quick dial buttons with live preview images.
Tab Mix Plus Tab Mix Plus Enhance Firefox’s tab browsing capabilities. This add-on includes such features as duplicating tabs, controlling tab focus, tab clicking options, undo closed tabs and windows, plus much more. It also includes a full-featured session manager with crash recovery that can save and restore combination of opened tabs and windows. Version 4.1.9pre.150815a1 works with Pale Moon.
VimFx VimFx (✓) Once you get used to modal text editing with Vim, your fingers will yearn for an add-on like VimFx! This extension adds Vim-style keyboard shortcuts for browsing and navigation, effectively eliminating the need for a computer mouse. Version 0.5.3.1-signed works with Pale Moon. However, make sure to disable updates for this specific add-on, by selecting this from about:addons → VimFX → More.
xclear xclear Clear the contents of search fields and the navigation bar at the click of a button.

Downloading

Downloading
icon add-on FF PM use
MozArchiver MozArchiver MIME HyperText (MHT) is Internet Explorer’s single file web page archiving format. Whereas the Mozilla Archive Format (MAFF), through its use of ZIP, results in much more compact archive files for web pages containing video or audio. MozArchiver saves and opens both file formats.
UnMHT UnMHT (✓) Save complete web pages, including text and graphics, into a single MHT file. Allows for automatic filename string replacements through its extensive preference settings. Version 7.3.0.5.1-signed works with Pale Moon, but currently only for saving.
Video DownloadHelper Video DownloadHelper Download series of video and image links all at once. Version 4.9.24.1-signed works with Pale Moon.
Web Developer Web Developer Adds various web developer tools to the browser.

Real-time information

Most of below extensions are designed to show additional real-time information in the add-on bar at the bottom of the browser window. However, since Firefox version 29 the status bar is no longer available by default. Use the Classic Theme Restorer extension (see previous section) to regain the status bar.

Real-time information
icon add-on FF PM use
FoxClocks FoxClocks use Pale Moon version Shows times around the world in the status bar. Daylight saving time is automatically dealt with. Requires Classic Theme Restorer.
Sun Cult Sun Cult Worldwide Sunrise, Sunset, Twilight, Moonrise and Moonset…
Weather Watcher Live Weather Watcher Live Get real-time weather conditions, hourly & daily forecasts, and severe alerts from WeatherBug and NWS weather stations.
What’s the Tide? What’s the Tide? Show up-to-date international tidal data in the status bar, from whatsthetide.com.

Maps

Maps
icon add-on FF PM use
Quick Maps Quick Maps Get a Google Maps™ tooltip box attached to any address on any website or highlight text + use right-click menu to show it on a map immediately!

Spell Checkers

Spell checkers for use in form fields are installed automatically with (X)Ubuntu on a system wide level. Firefox —and for that matter Pale Moon— will not remember the default spell checking language due to a persistant software bug.

This can be remedied by installing one —and only one— spell check dictionary add‑on. This will then create the missing Dictionaries tab in the Add‑on view. More importantly, this single dictionary add‑on will impose the default spell checking language upon Firefox and Pale Moon. Meanwhile, any other system wide languages remain available.

Spell checker
icon add-on FF PM use
British English Dictionary British English Dictionary British Dictionary version 2 for Firefox, Thunderbird and SeaMonkey, forked by Marco A. G. Pinto.

Dictionaries

Dictionaries
icon add-on FF PM use
Oxford Dictionaries Oxford Dictionaries Search Oxford Dictionaries Online for World English word definitions, pronunciation, example sentences and etymology. No subscription required.
S3 Google Translator S3 Google Translator Add the power of Google Translate’s automatic translations to your browser! Supports the translation of selected text, an entered phrase or a whole webpage between any of 80+ languages.

Encyclopædia

Encyclopædia
icon add-on FF PM use
Wikipedia SSL Wikipedia (SSL) Encrypt data-exchange with the English language Wikipedia using SSL, with these limitations.
Wikipedia SSL Wikipedia DE SSL Encrypt data exchange with the German language Wikipedia using SSL, with these limitations.
Wikipedia FR Wikipedia (fr) Non-encrypted French language Wikipedia
Wikipedia Wikipedia (es) Non-encrypted Spanish language Wikipedia
Wikipedia Wikipedia (nl) Non-encrypted Dutch language Wikipedia

Search engines

Search engines
icon add-on FF PM use
Firefox Add-ons Firefox Add-ons Perhaps the most hidden search engine of them all; Once on the Firefox Add-on web page, click on the down arrow in the browser’s search field and select “Add Firefox Add-on”. Now you can use this search engine to look for a specific Firefox add-on.
Ixquick Ixquick HTTPS Privacy Search Engine Ixquick.nl is the Dutch English-language counterpart of Startpage.com, “the world’s most private search engine” — if we may believe this. Anyhow, being located in the Netherlands, this browser is subject to European regulations which tend to protect privacy much more so than US legislation.
Search by Image for Google Search by Image for Google Right click on an image to quickly find higher resolution versions via Google Reverse Image search.
QRZ QRZ.com search plugin Swiftly look up ham operator details on QRZ.com, the most popular amateur (ham) radio call sign database.

Web development

Web development
icon add-on FF PM use
Auto Reload Auto Reload Reload page automatically when selected local files are changed.
My CopyFixer My CopyFixer Use [Ctrl]+[C] when nothing is selected to copy the page title and URL in various formats. Requires Classic Theme Restorer.
Developer Tools Developer Tools The Pale Moon (codename Tycho) Web Developer Tools
DOM Inspector DOM Inspector Inspect and edit the live DOM of any web document or XUL application.
Firebug Firebug Debug CSS, HTML and JavaScript live in any web page.
Type-o-matic Type-o-matic Typography This add-on extends the before-mentioned Firebug add-on with tools for untangling web typography. On any page, find out which fonts are used and how.
View Source Chart View Source Chart Analyze page source in a remarkably efficient way.
Webcompat.com Reporter Webcompat.com Reporter Easily report web browser bugs and web site compatibility issues at webcompat.com.
Web Developer Web Developer Adds various web developer tools to the browser.
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Creative Commons Licence
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution‑NonCommercial‑ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Other licensing available on request.
GNU GPL v3
Unless otherwise stated, all originally authored software on this site is licensed under the terms of GNU GPL version 3.
cookie
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Hence, no personal data is collected and GDPR compliance is met.
Moreover, this domain does not set any first party cookies.

All Google ads shown on this web site are, irrespective of your location,
restricted in data processing to meet compliance with the CCPA and GDPR.
However, Google AdSense may set third party cookies for traffic analysis and
use JavaScript to obtain a unique set of browser data.
Your browser can be configured to block third party cookies.
Furthermore, installing an ad blocker like EFF's Privacy Badger
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Google's ad policies can be found here.
This page employs a Python Bottle server‑side script.
This page includes an open-source client-side script, written in Python and
transcoded by Brython to make it run as secure JavaScript in the browser.
Static XHTML generated from Markdown by Pandoc and
the GNU/Linux make, sed and gpp commands.
LaTeXmath markup rendered with MathJax.
BibTeX references are best read with JabRef.
Unattended CSS typesetting with Prince.
This work is published at https://hamwaves.com/palemoon/en/.
profile for Serge Stroobandt on Stack Exchange, a network of free, community-driven Q&A sites
GnuPG
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echo c2VyZ2VAc3Ryb29iYW5kdC5jb20K |base64 -d
Last update: Wednesday, September 1, 2021.