Some text-entry boxes in Firefox use a fixed-space font – Courier New. It’s not the easiest font to read, so I have changed Firefox to use a difference font instead.

Click on the Firefox button and then Options. Click on Content, then the Advanced button in the Fonts & Colours section. Click the Monospace menu and select the alternative font. You may need to give a couple of try first before you decide on one.

Click OK in both windows to make the change. This font will now be used in text boxes that previously used Courier New. Now that’s much easier than trying on trendy clothes to see what looks good right?

Hi there. There are a number of options and mechanisms to block adverts, but my favourite is a plugin for Firefox called AdBlock Plus. It’s pretty simple to install.  Just go to the Adblock Plus page on addons.mozilla.org and click the big green installation button. Confirm installation and restart the application when asked.

Once your browser restarts, you’ll be asked to choose a filter so that the plugin will know what to block and what not. This looks like this the image alongside. I tend to go with the default subscription and it works quite well.

Once it’s all set up you can forget about your adverts; you won’t see another one, unless you want to, that is. If there are any pages that you would like to see adverts on, you can simply right-click on the plugin icon and tell it to Disable the plugin on that page. You can select a page or an entire site.

Try it out!

I’ve had a closer look at the site you mentioned and it’s not just maximising the window. The site actually resizes your window to take up the complete desktop, but it’s not quite maximised, so you can’t even click on Restore to take it back to it’s original size. I hate it when sites do this, regardless of whether they’re blogs, hyperlocal sites or ecommerce sites for prom dresses.

Here’s what you can do. Click on the Tools menu and then on Options. Click on the Content tab and then Advanced. You’ll see a dialog box like this:

Click on the option to ‘Move or resize existing windows” so that the tick disappears and click on the OK button twice. Voila, the website won’t be able to mess around with your windows now.

As you say, HTML 5 support can still be flaky at times. It’s important to realise that this is an evolving standard and hasn’t been ratified yet, so it’s every user on his/her own. And you’re right, some sites work better than others.

There’s a FireFox plugin that can help called HTML5toggle that’s designed for just this purpose. Check it out.

Remember when you’re playing with new technologies there’s always a risk. You may decide to steer away for now; it’s not like you’re going to get a multiple car insurance discount for making use of it.

Here’s what you need to do. Type something into any text-entry box on a web page, right-click anywhere within the box and ensure Check Spelling is ticked and Languages is set to English/United Kingdom. If not, click Add Dictionaries, and follow the prompts to download the English (British) dictionary.

That’s not too hard is it? Much easier they trying to figure out the best weight gain supplements on the market.

If this is a new computer, the chances are that you’re missing the software you need to recognise and read PDF files. It’s called Adobe reader and without it your computer won’t manage to make head or tail of the PDF files you’re trying to download.

To ensure the Firefox plug-in is installed, use Firefox to download the software. Start Firefox, and visit the Adobe website. Click on the Get Adobe Reader icon on the right-hand side of the page.

Deselect the option to install the free McAfee Security Scan and click on the yellow download button. Click on the ‘Click here to download’ link if the download does not start. Save and run the file that downloads.

Next time you open your browser you’ll be able to read any PDF file you want, whether it’s an IRS W-4 form or a list of the best fat burners around.

All the top browses block pop-up adverts now, but to remove other adverts you need to use a plugin or add on. I personally use Adblock Plus for Firefox, shown here:

It’s a great plugin that helps keep out all the extra content in your browsing that you don’t need any more. So if you’re not interested in banner ads about testosterone booster or buttons on Facebook, just install this and they will automatically disappear.

I got this question from an elderly gentleman I was speaking to some time ago. His exact word were that his browser looked like it had taken a diet pill and that everything looked tiny. Well, one of the features of Internet Explorer 7 is that it allows you to easily zoom in and zoom out of a page. Changing the zoom factor is pretty easy too. There’s a slider at the right bottom of the browser window that lets you modify that:

This lets you change the zoom factor nice and easily so that you get look closely or zoom out of a web page.

You can also control this through a simple keypress. To make text larger hold down the Ctrl key and press the + key as many times as necessary. Pressing Ctrl and – has the opposite effect, and Ctrl and 0 will reset the text to its normal size. These keyboard controls also work in Firefox.

You’re right, clicking on the Close button only removed the bar for that current session. There is a way you can hide the tab, but you can only do this if you’re using Firefox and the AdBlock Plus plugin. AdBlock Plus is one of my favourite Firefox plugins. It hides ads, banners and all sorts of annoying things from your browsing experience. If you don’t use it I seriously recommend it. Anyway, here’s what you need to do:

1. Selected Tools and click AdBlock Plus
2. Click on Add filter and paste in the following code snippet:

twitter.com#H1(class=elections-promotion)

3. Click OK

And there you have it. If you don’t have AdBlock, you’ll need to get it, but you won’t regret it one bit. Advertisements have become just like luggage when traveling. You may need them sometimes, but most of the time you can get around quicker without them. If you don’t use it yet, try it out; your browsing experience will change forever.

Camille from Cupidopolis asked me this question when she wanted to print a screenshot from her website. Unfortunately this scrolled down for quite a few screenfulls, so taking individual screenshots and gluing them all together just wasn’t an option.

To solve the problem, I found a great Addon for Firefox called Page Saver that lets you capture complete images of web pages and do whatever you want with them. The plugin comes in two variants, a free one with basic functionality and a “Pro” one that has some extra features. The free one was adequate for what we needed so I proceeded to download it. Once activated, the plugin adds some options to your menus and a handy camera icon to your toolbar:

The toolbar icon is the simplest way to use the plugin. To test it out, I visited a website that sold dog supplies and clicked the button:

Mission accomplished, the entire page was now in a single image on my hard disk. Hope you find this useful too.