Denver Dev Blog » WebBrowser

Bespin, the Mozilla Web Based Editor

Matthew McCullough — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 06:01:41 +0000

Mozilla has just released a web based programmer’s editor that runs entirely in your browser. It is aptly named Bespin, because it runs entirely in the cloud. Skeptics beware, this has the potential to blow your mind. A quick review of the screencast shows of the power and possibilities that a web based editor is strategically poised to execute. Collaborative editing. Collaborative code review. Plugins. Borrowing someone else’s setup of plugins. A developer’s mind quickly pants with excitement for this to move from alpha to beta as soon as possible. Go Dion!

Mouseless Web Browsing

Matthew McCullough — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 18:14:00 +0000

I’m a keyboard lover. The productivity from keyboard shortcuts is just amazing. So I’m constantly keeping an eye out for new keyboard navigation techniques. Web browsers have been a sore point, because to click a link with the keyboard you first have to tab to it. This can be, on link heavy pages, 20 or more tabs before I can hit enter. Hardly productive if you ask me.

That’s where Mouseless Browsing for Firefox comes in. It puts a number next to each link and you just type the number on the keyboard, press enter, and away you go. It couldn’t be easier. Go forth and use the mouse no more for your web browsing efforts and watch your productivity take a leap!

DNS, Tertiary SubDomain Tricks for Web 2.0 Apps

Matthew McCullough — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 05:03:00 +0000

Never really thought about this approach before, but if your DNS * record for your domain maps to your web server, you can use just a servlet filter or whatever other technology you want to use to capture custom tertiary level subdomains URLs and redirect to a user-specific page.

For example, if you want http://matthew.ambientideas.com to take your users to a user-profile page, there’s no need to wire in your DNS to your software app, constantly updating it per user. You just capture the URL, parse out the tertiary domain part, and redirect, say, to http://ambientideas.com/users/?user=matthew. Easy, straightforward and cool. Kudos to Jordan for the first implementation for an upcoming app from Ambient Ideas.

Ubiquity – QuickSilver Like Plugin for Firefox

Matthew McCullough — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 00:24:00 +0000

If you like Quicksilver for your Mac, then you should check out Ubiquity for Firefox. Same concept, with the power extended to the browser. Video review available.