Customizing Mozilla

# My Sidebar

In this section: What is My Sidebar? Using My Sidebar Adding My Sidebar Tabs Customizing Individual My Sidebar Tabs Reorganizing My Sidebar Tabs Removing My Sidebar Tabs Opening, Closing, and Resizing My Sidebar

## What is My Sidebar?

My Sidebar is a customizable frame in your browser where you can keep items that you need to use all the time—the latest news and weather, your address book or Buddy List, stock quotes, a calendar—and many other options you can choose. My Sidebar presents these items to you in tabs that are continually updated.

Mozilla comes with some My Sidebar tabs already set up, but you can customize My Sidebar by adding, removing, and rearranging tabs.

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## Using My Sidebar

Unless you have closed My Sidebar, it is always open at the left side of your browser. To view a tab:

- Click a tab's title; for instance, click the words "What's Related." The What's Related tab opens, showing you a list of web pages related to the page you are currently viewing.

If you don't see My Sidebar, it may be closed. To open it:
| Move the mouse pointer up and down along the left hand border of the Mozilla window. The pointer changes to a hand when it touches the "handle" for My Sidebar, as shown in the picture. Click the handle to open My Sidebar. Note: If My Sidebar is not selected from the View menu in Navigator, you will not see the frame or its handle.

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## Adding My Sidebar Tabs

To add a new tab:

1. Click "Tabs" at the top of My Sidebar, and select Customize Sidebar from the menu.
2. In the Customize My Sidebar dialog box, select a tab from the list on the left. You can open and close folders by clicking the triangles.
3. Click Add.
4. Continue adding as many tabs as you like.
5. Click OK to finish.

Tip: To preview a My Sidebar tab before adding it, select a tab from the list on the left side of the Customize My Sidebar dialog box and click Preview. After a few seconds, the tab displays in the Tab Preview pop-up window.

Tip: To view an extensive and categorized list of Sidebar tabs available for My Sidebar, click "Tabs" at the top of My Sidebar, and select Sidebar Directory.

You can also turn My Sidebar tabs on and off.

1. Click "Tabs" at the top of My Sidebar. Current tabs are listed in the lower part of the menu.
2. Select the tabs you want displayed in My Sidebar. Remove the checkmark to turn a tab off (it will still be available from the menu).

Tip: To quickly turn off a My Sidebar tab, right-click on its name and choose Hide Tab.

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## Customizing Individual My Sidebar Tabs

Note: Not all tabs can be customized.

1. Click "Tabs" at the top of My Sidebar, and select Customize Sidebar from the menu.
2. Select a tab from the list on the right.
3. Click Customize Tab. A window appears with information and options for customizing the tab.

   The instructions vary depending on the source of the tab—in addition to Mozilla, tab providers can be any company, organization, or individual who uses the Internet.

4. After you follow the tab provider's instructions, close the customization window (or follow the provider's instructions to close it).
5. Click OK to finish.

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## Reorganizing My Sidebar Tabs

1. Click "Tabs" at the top of My Sidebar, and select Customize Sidebar from the menu.
2. Select a tab from the list on the right.
3. Click Up and Down to change the tab's placement.
4. Repeat steps 1 and 2 to continue reorganizing as many tabs as you like.
5. Click OK to finish.

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## Removing My Sidebar Tabs

1. Click "Tabs" at the top of My Sidebar, and select Customize Sidebar from the menu.
2. Select a tab from the list on the right.
3. Click Remove.
4. Continue removing as many tabs as you like.
5. Click OK to finish.

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## Opening, Closing, and Resizing My Sidebar

Use My Sidebar's handles to open, close, and resize My Sidebar's frame:
| If My Sidebar is closed, you can still see its handle. If the handle is missing, select View and then My Sidebar. Move the mouse pointer up and down along the left edge of the Mozilla window. The pointer changes to a hand when it touches the "handle" for My Sidebar, as shown in the picture. Click the handle to open and close My Sidebar. Click and drag the handle to resize My Sidebar.

To remove My Sidebar, including the handle:

- Open the View menu, and uncheck the My Sidebar option.

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# Tabbed Browsing

In this section: What is Tabbed Browsing? Setting up Tabbed Browsing Opening Tabs Closing Tabs

## What is Tabbed Browsing?

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## Setting up Tabbed Browsing

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## Opening Tabs

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## Closing Tabs

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# Changing Fonts, Colors, and Themes

In this section: Changing the Default Fonts Changing the Default Colors Changing the Theme

## Changing the Default Fonts

Normally, web pages are displayed in the default font set by your browser, or in a font chosen by the web pages' authors.

To change the default fonts:

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Under the Appearance category, choose Fonts. (If no options are visible in this category, click to expand the list.)
3. From the "Fonts for" drop-down list, choose a character set. For instance, to set default fonts for the Western (roman) character set, choose "Western."
4. Select whether proportional text should be serif or sans-serif. Then specify the font size you want for proportional text. You can select either Serif (like Times Roman) or Sans-serif (like Arial).
5. If an appropriate font is available for your language character set, select fonts for Serif, Sans-Serif, Cursive, Fantasy, and Monospace. You can also specify what font size you want for monospace text.
6. Specify whether the default font should be serif or sans serif.
7. Select a fixed-width font and size. Certain types of text, such as equations and formulas, are displayed in a fixed-width font.

Many web page authors choose their own fonts and font sizes. To allow fonts other than the ones specified in your preferences, check "Allow documents to use other fonts."

To adjust the readability of fonts, select from the drop-down list the dots per inch (dpi) for displaying web pages. Select "Other" to open the Calibrate Resolution dialog box, which allows you to calibrate your resolution by measuring how long a line appears on your screen. Increased screen resolution may will improve text readability on some screens.

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## Changing the Default Colors

Normally, the background and text colors on web pages are determined by the default colors set by your browser, or by the pages' authors.

To change the default colors:

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Under the Appearance category, choose Colors. (If no options are visible in this category, click to expand the list.)
3. Click the colored blocks next to "Text," "Background," "Unvisited Links," and "Visited Links." Choose a color for each from the color chart. You can also specify that links should be underlined.

Most web page authors choose their own colors. You can override the authors' intentions by selecting "Use my chosen colors, ignoring the colors specified."

When viewing the source of a web page, you can see the HTML syntax of the source of a web page highlighted in specific colors by selecting "Enable syntax highlighting."

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## Changing the Theme

You can change the look and feel Mozilla by changing themes.

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Under the Appearance category, choose Themes.
3. Click to select the theme you want to use.
4. Click Apply, then click OK to adopt your selection as your theme.

   Note: You need to quit and restart Mozilla after you apply a new theme in order for the change to take effect.

Shortcut: You can also change themes by opening the View menu, choosing Apply Themes, and then choosing the theme you want to use.

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# Toolbars

In this section: Navigation Toolbar Personal Toolbar Taskbar Hiding a Toolbar

## Navigation Toolbar

The Navigation toolbar, pictured here, helps you move around the Web.

Back | Forward | Reload | Stop

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## Personal Toolbar

The personal toolbar is completely customizable—you decide what you want to keep there. The personal toolbar comes with some buttons already enabled, including your My Netscape page, your home page, search, and shopping. You can easily add, delete, and rearrange items in the personal toolbar.

#### Turning Buttons On and Off

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Click Navigator.
3. Under "Select the buttons you want to see in the toolbars," to choose the buttons that you want on your toolbar.
4. Click OK.

#### Adding Personal Toolbar bookmarks

You can add buttons for your favorite bookmarks, or folders containing groups of bookmarks. To create a new bookmark to add to the personal toolbar:

1. Open a web page you want to bookmark.
2. Drag the bookmark icon (located to the left of URL in the Location Bar) to a desired place on the personal toolbar. You can drag the icon directly to the personal toolbar, or to a folder on the personal toolbar. See "Adding Personal Toolbar bookmark folders" for more information on adding bookmark marks folder to the personal toolbar.

Each item in the personal toolbar folder appears as a toolbar button. You may need to enlarge the browser window to see them all.

Adding Personal Toolbar bookmark folders

You can add bookmark folders to the personal toolbar in order to sort your favorite bookmarks into categories. For example, you can have one bookmark folder on the personal toolbar for hobby-related bookmarks and another bookmark folder for work-related bookmarks. To add a new bookmark to the personal toolbar:

1. Right-click on the personal toolbar where you want to create a new folder. Right-click on an existing folder to add your new folder on the right side of it.
   A context-menu will appear.
2. Click "New Folder" from the pop-up menu.
3. Type a name for your new bookmark folder. By default, the name is "New Folder."
4. Click OK to confirm your new bookmark folder name.

#### Designating a Bookmark Folder as Your Personal Toolbar Folder

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. Select the bookmark folder whose items you want to appear on the toolbar.
3. From the View menu, choose Set as Personal Toolbar Folder.

The buttons in your personal toolbar now correspond to the bookmarks in the folder you designated.

#### Removing Bookmarks From the Personal Toolbar

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. Click the Personal Toolbar Folder.
3. Select the bookmark or folder you want to delete.
4. Press Delete on your keyboard.
5. Close the Manage Bookmarks window.

Tip: To quickly remove a bookmark placed on the personal toolbar (not in a folder), right-click on the bookmark and select Delete.

#### Rearranging the Personal Toolbar

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, click the Personal Toolbar Folder.
3. Select a bookmark or folder and drag it to a new location.
4. When you are finished rearranging items, close your Bookmarks window.

Note: Buttons on the personal toolbar such as Search and Home Page cannot be rearranged, but they can be turned off and on.

Tip: To quickly move a bookmark placed on the personal toolbar, or to move it out of a folder, click and drag the bookmark to another location on the personal toolbar or to a folder.

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## Taskbar

Use the taskbar at the bottom of the Mozilla window to switch between tasks (such as browsing, mail, and instant messaging).

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## Hiding a Toolbar

There are two ways to hide the toolbars.

To minimize a toolbar:

- Click the small triangle at the left of the toolbar. To show the toolbar, click the triangle again. (Note: you cannot hide the taskbar using this method.)

To completely hide a toolbar, including its triangle:

1. Open the View menu.
2. Choose Show/Hide and uncheck the toolbars you want to hide.

To reverse this action, open the View menu, choose Show, and then select the toolbars you want to show.

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# Bookmarks

In this section: What Are Bookmarks? Using Bookmarks Creating New Bookmarks Organizing Your Bookmarks Changing Individual Bookmarks Searching Your Bookmarks Exporting or Importing a Bookmark List

## What Are Bookmarks?

Bookmarks are shortcuts to your favorite and most-visited web pages. Rather than typing in long URLs (web addresses), you can create bookmarks that take you directly to the pages you want to see.

You access your bookmarks through the Bookmarks menu, the Bookmarks tab on My Sidebar, and the Manage Bookmarks window. You can control what's listed in the Bookmarks menu by adding bookmarks for your favorite web pages and organizing your list of bookmarks any way you want.

## Using Bookmarks

To use a bookmark:

1. Open the Bookmarks menu.
2. Choose a bookmark from the list.

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## Creating New Bookmarks

You can bookmark your favorite web sites to make it easy to return to them.

To bookmark the current page, perform one of these steps:

- To add a bookmark to the Bookmarks menu, open the Bookmarks menu and choose Add Bookmark.
- To add a bookmark to a specific folder on the Bookmarks menu, or to provide a specific name or URL for your bookmark:
  1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose File Bookmark. Choose from any of these options:
     - Name: Type a name for the bookmark if you want a different name.
     - URL: Type a URL for the bookmark if you want a different URL.
     - Create in: Choose a folder in which to create your bookmark.
     - New Folder: Click this to create a new folder in which to create your bookmark.
     - Default: Click this to file the boomark in your designated New Bookmark folder.
  2. Click OK to add the bookmark.

- To add a bookmark to the personal toolbar, drag the bookmark icon next to the Location Bar to a place on the personal toolbar. You can add a bookmark to the personal toolbar or to a folder on the personal toolbar. For more information about adding bookmarks to the personal toolbar, see "Adding Personal Toolbar bookmarks".
- To add a bookmark to the Bookmarks tab in My Sidebar, open My Sidebar, select the Bookmarks tab, and drag the bookmark icon next to the Location Bar to a place on the bookmark list in the Bookmarks tab.

Note: After adding a bookmark using any of the methods listed above, it can be accessed using the My Sidebar Bookmarks tab, the Manage Bookmarks window, and the Bookmarks menu.

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## Organizing Your Bookmarks

To organize your bookmarks, open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks. Perform any of the following tasks in your Manage Bookmarks window.

Tip: You can open the Manage Bookmarks window from the Bookmarks tab in My Sidebar. Click on Manage at the top of the Bookmarks tab.

To view bookmarks inside of folders:

- Click the open/close triangles at the left of each folder to view its contents.

To move a bookmark or a folder to another location in the list:

- Drag the bookmark or folder that you want to move to the new location. To put a bookmark in a folder, drag it to the folder.

To create a new folder or separator:

- In your Bookmarks window, click New Folder or New Separator.

To remove a bookmark or a folder from the list:

1. Click to highlight the bookmark or folder that you want to remove.
2. Press the Delete key on your keyboard, or click Delete in your Bookmarks window.

#### Handling New Bookmarks and Bookmarked Search Results.

When you create a new bookmark, Mozilla normally adds it to the bottom of your bookmarks list. If you prefer to file your bookmarks in a folder, you can designate a new bookmarks folder.

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, select a folder to hold new bookmarks.
3. Open the View menu and choose Set as New Bookmark Folder.

If you use the My Sidebar Search tab to locate web pages, you can save your search results by clicking the "Bookmark this Search" button in the Search tab. Saved search results are placed in their own folder at the bottom of the bookmarks list. For instance, if you searched for "parrots," and then clicked "Bookmark this Search", a folder named "Search: parrots" would be added to your bookmarks list. Each time you save search results, a new folder is added.

If you prefer to file all your saved search results in a single folder, you can designate an Internet search folder.

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, select a folder to hold search results.
3. Open the View menu and choose "Set as New Internet Search Folder."

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## Changing Individual Bookmarks

You can change the information for any individual bookmark.

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, click a bookmark.
3. Click Properties.
4. In the bookmark Properties dialog box window, click the Info tab.

You can rename the bookmark (the name appears in your bookmark list), add descriptive information, or set a keyword. (You can type a bookmark's keyword into the location field to go to the bookmarked site.)

You can also set Mozilla to check bookmarked web sites for changes.

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, click a bookmark.
3. Click Properties.
4. In the bookmark Properties dialog box, click the Schedule tab.
5. Use the pull down lists to specify how frequently you want Mozilla to check the bookmarked page for changes.
6. If you want to be notified when the bookmarked page changes, choose a notification option.

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## Searching Your Bookmarks

To search the bookmarks list:

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, open the Edit menu and choose Find Bookmarks. You see the Find Bookmarks dialog box.
3. In the drop-down lists, choose options to define your search, and then click Find. Bookmarks that match your search criteria are displayed.
4. Double-click a bookmark in the list to go to that page.
5. Choose from the following Search options:

- Choose "contains," "starts with," or "ends with" if you know only part of the word or phrase for which you're searching.
- Choose "is" if you know exactly what you're searching for.
- Choose "is not" or "doesn't contain" to exclude pages.
- Click the fill-in field and type all or part of name or URL (web address) for the bookmarks or history listings that you want to find or exclude.

Tip: If the list is hard to read, try expanding the search results window.

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## Exporting or Importing a Bookmark List

Your bookmarks are stored in a file named bookmarks.html. You can export a copy of this file and save it in a folder of your choosing. You can then edit it and treat it as you would any HTML file.

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, open the File menu, and choose Export Bookmarks.
3. In the "Export Bookmark file" dialog box, choose a folder. Your bookmarks.html file will be copied into the folder you designate.
4. Click Save.

Your Mozilla bookmarks are not altered by this procedure.

You can also import bookmarks files from other sources. For example, you can import bookmarks files from earlier Mozilla versions, other browsers, or from bookmark files that your friends send you.

Before you start, make sure that the bookmark file you want to import is an HTML file.

1. Open the Bookmarks menu and choose Manage Bookmarks.
2. In your Bookmarks window, open the File menu and choose Import Bookmarks.
3. In the "Import Bookmark file" dialog box, locate and select the bookmark file you want to import.
4. Click Save.

The imported bookmark file is treated as a group of new bookmarks, and added to the bottom of your bookmarks list. If you have designated a new bookmark folder, the imported bookmarks are added to that folder.

Note: Importing a bookmark file imports the bookmarks and folders from that file. It does not create two bookmark files.

You can use any bookmarks file as your default Mozilla bookmarks, as long as it is an HTML file and is named "bookmarks.html."

To replace your bookmarks.html file, close all Mozilla windows and exit from Mozilla:

1. Go to the directory that contains Mozilla on your computer, and find the Users subdirectory.
2. In the Users subdirectory, open the directory for your current profile.
3. In the directory for your profile, find the current bookmarks.html file and rename it. (For instance, rename it "bookmarks.old.")
4. Put the new bookmarks.html file in the directory containing your profile. This replaces the file you just renamed.
5. Restart Mozilla. Your new bookmarks file will be used as the default bookmarks.

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# Specifying How Mozilla Starts Up

In this section: Specifying a Starting Page Changing Your Home Page Specifying Which Components Open at Launch

## Specifying a Starting Page

You can specify the page that loads when the browser starts:

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Under "When Navigator starts up display," choose whether you want a blank page, your home page, or the last web page visited to open automatically when you launch your browser.

   Note: If you selected Home Page, type the URL in the Location field.

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## Changing Your Home Page

Your home page is the page that opens when you click the Home button in the personal toolbar. Depending on how your preferences are set, it may also be the page that opens automatically when you launch Mozilla.

To specify your home page:

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Click the Navigator category.
3. In the Home page section, perform one of the following:
   - Type your home page's URL (web address) in the Location: field.
   - Click Use Current Page to make the page currently displayed in the browser window your home page.
   - Click Choose File to select a file from your computer's hard drive.

Tip: To specify your home page quickly, drag the bookmark icon from the Location Bar to the Home Page button on the personal toolbar.

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## Specifying Which Components Open at Launch

1. Open the Edit menu and choose Preferences.
2. Click the Appearance category.
3. Select the components you want opened automatically each time you start Mozilla.

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12 March, 2002