Where do these sounds come from?

[Mayayana]

| >Don't you think maybe it's time
| >to close some tabs? Why are they open if you're
| >not using them?
|
| Mostly, I'm not done reading them.

I often do that, too, but I tend to keep the number
small so I won't lose track. I avoid tabs for the same
reason. Most people seem to prefer tabs. I find it
harder to keep track of open windows with tabs. I prefer
a separate window for each page. When doing a search
or clicking links I'll also almost always open them in a
separate window. Then when I decide to clean up the
open windows clogging the taskbar I discover the articles
I forgot to read.

 

[micky]

There are search tools in the left margin that allow you to specify a
date range. They aren't very granular, but they should help.

Oh, you're right!! Thanks a lot.

I looked around, especially when the Options rectangle showed up in
the uppper right a few days ago, but missed them.

 

[micky]

Although many people have never heard of Maxthon, it's far and away my
favorite Browser. I like it much better than IE or Firefox.

Thanks and thanks, BillW. I'm dl'ing now. It's version 3. FF is
up to version 11. Doesn't that mean that FF is almost 4 times as
good?

Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP

An attempt at humor. No need to explain things to me.

 

[micky]

I think IE has always had the capability you say doesn't exist.

IIRC It used to work the way I want it.

If
it's not enabled by default, have you tried enabling it?

I thought I looked at all the options, and didn't find it. I looked
at Inrternet Optrions again, and don't see it or don't recognize it.
;-(

 

[Char Jackson]

IIRC It used to work the way I want it.


I thought I looked at all the options, and didn't find it. I looked
at Inrternet Optrions again, and don't see it or don't recognize it.
;-(

I have IE8, so if you use a different version you may have to hunt
around a bit.

In IE8, go to Tools, Internet Options. On the General tab, the second
area up from the bottom is called "Tabs - Change how webpages are
displayed in tabs". Click the Settings button and in the next dialog
uncheck the third option, called "Always switch to new tabs when they
are created". That's it.

(I assume you already have the first option enabled, "Enable tabbed
browsing".)

 

[Nil]

The point was that it already was built in. They had to make an
effort to remove the setting option and to rename the setting
itself. In one very unusual move they deactivated 3rd-party image
blocking for anyone who had been using it.

Besides Adblock Plus, I also see several add-ons with names like
"Image Block", "Image and Flach Blocker", and "Gif Block". Since
Adblock Plus has been around since at least 2006, maybe Mozilla
decided that was a better solution than the one that they had built
in. I don't know, and it doesn't matter. The functionality is there.

They have lots of developments in the works. They're planning a
new system for silent updating:

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9225235/Mozilla_will_start_F
irefox_silent_updates_in_June

If you don't like the feature, turn it off.

They're even working a system for "push notification" from
websites, which is essentially the ability for web sites to spam
you even when you're not visiting them. (Allegedly this will only
be done with permission, but it seems unlikely that most people
are going to want to grant such permission.)

http://arstechnica.com/business/news/2012/02/mozilla-developing-web
-push-notification-system-for-firefox.ars

If you don't like the feature, turn it off.

Personally I prefer software that's not so overproduced and that
doesn't decide for me when to update or call home, so I have a dim
view of the direction that Mozilla is heading in.

I don't like software to update itself, either. That's why I turn
the feature off.

Apparently you don't mind.

I don't mind, because the features I don't like, I turn off. And
I've been able to add features that I like to Firefox via Add-Ons.
I'd rather have it that way than to have everything built in and not
have a choice.

Please consider using attributions, so people know whose words you
are quoting.

 

[Char Jackson]

Somewhat related to all this, how do you get the new tab (when clicking on a
link) to always open up maximized, instead of in a reduced size window?
Focus or no focus, I don't always get it (a maximized new tab from clicking
on a link). And dragging the windows doesn't fix it permanently, either..

I don't know, I've never seen that. I rarely use IE, though. Firefox
is my browser of choice.

 

[micky]

No, it means it's likely 4 times worse. "Less is more" (i.e. lower is
better, as is often the case with software .

Plus Pale Moon is often better (at least for me), anyways. Seems quicker to
load.

I never even heard of Pale Moon.

 

[micky]

I have IE8, so if you use a different version you may have to hunt
around a bit.

In IE8, go to Tools, Internet Options. On the General tab, the second
area up from the bottom is called "Tabs - Change how webpages are
displayed in tabs". Click the Settings button and in the next dialog
uncheck the third option, called "Always switch to new tabs when they
are created". That's it.

By golly it's there. I havent' tested it but I'm sure it would work .

I must admit, I didn't go through this one set of settings for a long
time. I don't know why. I

(I assume you already have the first option enabled, "Enable tabbed
browsing".)

Yes.

This may make IE tolerable. It's certainly a big improvement.

Thanks a lot.

 

[BillW50]

In J. P. Gilliver (John) typed:

In message <[email protected]>, BillW50 <[email protected]>
writes:
[]

I leave tabs open that I plan on returning to. Sometimes I don't
return in hours and sometimes days. I almost never have more than 12
tabs open though. And if anyone of them has annoying sounds that I
don't want to hear, I hit the speaker icon found on Maxthon 3
browser and it kills the sounds from webpages.

Yes, but surely - if I'm understanding your description of what it
does - that kills the sound from _all_ webpages, so if there's one
you now want to hear (either because you deliberately went to one
that had sound you'd want to hear, such as a video, or because a new
one had some sound that added to its function without being
undesirable), you wouldn't hear it? In which case you'd still need to
find which of your up to 12 was making the unwanted noises.

Perhaps a solution would be some icon that showed when sound was being
played - either that appeared in the bottom right corner only when
that tab was at the front, or that appeared in the tab itself. This
would of course take up real estate that others might want to keep
free (so ideally a configurable option).

I don't know all of the rules, but it always seems to get it right in my
experience. As I was streaming a radio station through Maxthon 3 and I
opened up a new tab which had talking ads on it. I hit the mute and the
ads silenced, but the radio kept playing. I suppose if it ever silenced
something you didn't want, you could probably open up another instance
of Maxthon (or any other browser) and have sounds on one and the other
one off.

 

[Mayayana]

| >If you don't like the feature, turn it off.
|
| See above.

First there's the fact that some things can't
be turned off... But also, why should I need to?!
Why should I have to become an expert on
about:config? For some reason Nil feels defensive
on Mozilla's behalf.

Additionally, that attitude also ignores the way the
whole business is structured. There are lots of things
that can be "turned off". But that adds another layer of
complexity, requiring that people actively learn about
the details. That approach effectively prevents 95+%
of people from "turning it off". Tech. companies
have been very successful, through a mixture of obscurity
and false abstruseness, at creating a situation where
only trained IT people can manage Windows, while most
people can be depended upon to do what the companies
want them to do. There's a great story about that sort of
thing here:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703467304575383530439838568.html

(About how InPrivate browsing was designed to give the
appearance of increased privacy in IE, while effectively
preventing any improvement in privacy controls.)

Third-party image blocking is a good example of this....
And Facebook Like buttons acting as spyware... And
removing security restrictions in Vista/7... One could go
on all day. People who "turn it off" are the rare exception
to the rule. Companies know that. Thus many new
"features" are strategies rather than options.

 

[Mayayana]

| If you don't like the feature, turn it off.
|

See below in my post to J. P. Gilliver.

| Please consider using attributions, so people know whose words you
| are quoting.

This has been discussed in the past. I'm not
going to keep debating it. Since you seem to
have some sort of very good archive search
feature I suggest you look for the thread between
J. P. Gilliver and myself, in which the pros and cons
of different approaches were discussed at length.

If you really can't tell who I'm responding to then
I can only suggest that you get a real newsreader
(not webpage news feeds) that provides a "treeview"
display that graphically shows the order of posts.
Then you don't need to do any guessing and you
don't need to open any extra windows to see the
course of the discussion.
In the above I see like so:

- Mayayana
- Nil
- Char Jackson
- Mayayana
- Nil

....etc. It's very clear to me who is responding to
whom, and I'm just using OE6.

 

[Mayayana]

| I don't wish to killfile you,

I'll do it for you. I joined this group because I like
to learn about the details of using Windows and
because I have help to offer. I've developed a lot
of tools and collected a lot of information that I
wanted for my own sake, and then have posted for
free to my website: www.jsware.net

But this group is mainly a dozen or so people who
don't need help. There aren't really all that many new
people asking questions. And I have better things to
do than to argue repeatedly about the alleged laws
of newsgroups. This thread is typical. It's become far
longer than necessary and filled with a lot of sniping
about posting format. Life's too short for that kind of
nonsense.

So, good luck to you all. Anyone who needs help with
JSWare tools is free to send an email. And you can use
any old format you like. You can use ALL CAPS if you like.
I won't even complain if you feel a compulsion to post
40-50 lines of newsgroup detritus in your email, above
your actual message. I realize that people coming out
of the console era and joining the 20th/21st century, with
its fancy GUIs, will need some time to adapt.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

In message <[email protected]>, BillW50 <[email protected]>
writes:
[]

I leave tabs open that I plan on returning to. Sometimes I don't return
in hours and sometimes days. I almost never have more than 12 tabs open
though. And if anyone of them has annoying sounds that I don't want to
hear, I hit the speaker icon found on Maxthon 3 browser and it kills the
sounds from webpages.

Yes, but surely - if I'm understanding your description of what it does
- that kills the sound from _all_ webpages, so if there's one you now
want to hear (either because you deliberately went to one that had sound
you'd want to hear, such as a video, or because a new one had some sound
that added to its function without being undesirable), you wouldn't hear
it? In which case you'd still need to find which of your up to 12 was
making the unwanted noises.

Then, one tab at a time, close it to see if it stops the sound. If it
doesn't, then click the Maxthon icon that brings back the lat closed
tab.

Even with 12 tabs, this shouldn't take long at all.


Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP

 

[Nil]

Mayayana's point was that the functionality was already there
intrinsically, and hasn't been removed because of these third party
add-ons (may have been there since before 2006): it's just been made
harder to find, i. e. removed from the normal configuration system.

I don't know why Mozilla chose to remove that feature, but my
speculation is that the add-ons did it better. I don't consider using
an add-on to be any more difficult than using a built-in function.

You're assuming that it will be possible to do so.

You're assuming it won't be possible. I can't imagine that I've never
heard of software that the automatic update feature can't be disabled.
Even Windows itself's can be.

 

[Nil]

...etc. It's very clear to me who is responding to
whom, and I'm just using OE6.

You don't exist in a vacuum, and the whole thing is not just about you.
Posts get detached from their context. Posts get quoted by others. Even
if the source of the quote is clear to you, it's not clear to others,
and if those words are in turn quoted by others, the true author will
be permanently obscured. Is that OK with you?

 

[Char Jackson]

By golly it's there. I havent' tested it but I'm sure it would work .

I must admit, I didn't go through this one set of settings for a long
time. I don't know why. I


Yes.

This may make IE tolerable. It's certainly a big improvement.

Thanks a lot.

You're welcome. I agree that it's annoying to switch to new tabs
automatically, so I'm glad this option exists in both IE and Firefox,
and possibly in other browsers.

 

[Char Jackson]

| If you don't like the feature, turn it off.
|

See below in my post to J. P. Gilliver.

| Please consider using attributions, so people know whose words you
| are quoting.

This has been discussed in the past. I'm not
going to keep debating it. Since you seem to
have some sort of very good archive search
feature I suggest you look for the thread between
J. P. Gilliver and myself, in which the pros and cons
of different approaches were discussed at length.

If you really can't tell who I'm responding to then
I can only suggest that you get a real newsreader
(not webpage news feeds) that provides a "treeview"
display that graphically shows the order of posts.
Then you don't need to do any guessing and you
don't need to open any extra windows to see the
course of the discussion.
In the above I see like so:

- Mayayana
- Nil
- Char Jackson
- Mayayana
- Nil

...etc. It's very clear to me who is responding to
whom, and I'm just using OE6.

And there's the FU attitude I referred to recently. What a shame.

 

[Nil]

The point Mayayana and I have been making is that they _haven't_
(yet?) removed the feature (blocking third-party) - they've just
made it difficult to invoke.

Are you saying that the option is still there? Then, what's the issue??
I couldn't find it in the menus system. If you're saying that it's only
available through about:config, then it's obviously not intended for
the average user, in which case the add-on is available to all. I
really don't have a problem with that.

Indeed. But doing it silently, i. e. such that it updates without
asking _unless_ you've turned it off, worries some people.

No, I don't like that either, but then I have all auto-updating
features turned off in all programs.

 

[BillW50]

In Nil typed:

No, I don't like that either, but then I have all auto-updating
features turned off in all programs.

I see a time coming soon that the user will no longer have a choice.
Heck it is already this way for server installs. Like for example you
can have the Windows Live 2008, 2009, or 2011 server install, and all
you will install is the latest and greatest version anyway. Times are
changing for sure. And many other software is this way too. Like
Logitech SetPoint install.