Manage Your Web 2.0 Tools with Firefox	Visited: 970 5.0/5.0 (3 votes total) Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
by Maxwell Finn June 15, 2009

Currently, Firefox is the most advanced web browser available to for download. The user-interface, password management, bookmarking and range of customization puts it in a league of its own. Ever since the day I downloaded Firefox, 2 years ago, I haven't looked back and the Firefox team has not let me down.

My favorite feature of the Firefox browser, is the ability to add and incorporate valuable tools into your personalized browser. Many of the top web 2.0 sites have Firefox add-ons, which allows the user to easily manage all of the web 2.0 tools they may own. If you are like most business professionals and entrepreneurs, web 2.0 is being integrated more and more into your daily routine. If this is the case, it is crucial to be as time-effective as possible. Without Firefox and its add-ons, I would be unable to stay on top of all my online networks and web tools.

If you are looking for a way to save time, while boosting productivity; this blog post is for you. Below are five Firefox add-ons I use on a daily basis to manage and expand my web presence:

1. TwitterFox

TwitterFox is a Firefox extension that notifies you of your friends' tweets on Twitter. This extension adds a tiny icon on the status bar which notifies you when your friends update their tweets. Also it has a small text input field to update your tweets. You can store multiple twitter accounts in this add-on and access all of them without having to visit the Twitter homepage and login. You simply click on the Twitter icon and a small screen pops up, which allows you to tweet from any website/view recent tweets and direct messages.

2. Facebook Toolbar

Integrate your Facebook life into your browser.

Search Facebook from anywhere: The Search Box allows you to easily search Facebook no matter where you are. Select a friend from the dropdown to go directly to their profile, or hit "enter" to see the search results.

Get Notified: Icons on the toolbar tell you how many new pokes, friend requests, and messages you have. A pop-up will notify you when your friends update their statuses, write a new note or interact with you on Facebook.

Connect with Friends: Click the icon to open the Facebook friends sidebar. You can sort your friends by name or status and easily interact with them and their profiles.

Share Content: The share button lets you share the page that you are currently browsing by sending it to friends or posting it to your profile.

3. Digg Toolbar

When you're browsing the web, the toolbar will let you know if a story has already been submitted to Digg and, if it has, how many Diggs and comments it got. If the page you're viewing isn't already on Digg, the toolbar will display a submit button, which will help you easily submit the story to Digg and share it with the entire Digg community. It's even easy to hide the toolbar; if you don't want to see it, simply click on the Digg guy in the navigation bar, and it will be hidden.

Latest Popular Content: The toolbar will alert you when new stories become popular on Digg by showing the story details in a small notification window at the bottom of the browser. And don't worry, you can control whether to see all recently popular stories or just those from the topics and media types you care about.

Follow Your Friends: A great way to discover the best content is to see what your friends are doing on Digg. Enter your Digg username in the settings window to receive notifications when you friends Digg, submit, or comment on stories. To go back and look at earlier notifications, click the Digg icon at the status bar at the bottom of the browser. All notifications can also be snoozed if you want to temporarily turn them off.

Customize: In addition to setting topics for notifications of popular stories and your Digg username for notifications of friends' activity, you can customize the placement of the notification window, how long it displays, and how links should be opened.

4. StumbleUpon

With StumbleUpon you can also connect with friends and share your discoveries, meet people that have similar interests, and check out what other people are discovering. The toolbar allows you to give a thumbs up or a thumbs down to the site you are currently viewing.

5. Delicious Bookmarks

This extension integrates your browser with Delicious (http://delicious.com), the leading social bookmarking service on the Web. It does this by augmenting the bookmarking functionality in Firefox with an enhanced experience that offers the following advantages:

- Search and browse your Delicious bookmarks
- Keep up to date on your Network and Links For You
- Access your bookmarks from any computer at any time
- Keep your bookmarks organized using tags
- Share your bookmarks with friends or anyone on the Web
- Import your existing Firefox bookmarks