Using Firefox

Navigating web pages

Viewing your home page

When you start Firefox, you will see your home page. By default, you will see Firefox's home page.

Tips:

* To display more web content on the screen, you can use Full Screen mode. Full Screen mode condenses the Firefox's Toolbars into one small toolbar. To enable Full Screen mode, simply select View > Full Screen or press F11.

* To go to your home page quickly, press AltOpt+Home.

Navigating to another page

You can navigate to a new web page by typing in its Internet address or URL into the Location Bar. URLs normally begin with "http://" followed by one or more names that identify the address. One example is "http://www.mozilla.org/".

1. Click the Location Bar to select the URL that is already there.

2. Type the URL of the page you want to visit. The URL you type replaces any text already in the Location Bar.

3. Press EnterReturn.

Tip: To quickly select the URL of the Location Bar, press CtrlCmd+L.

Don't know a URL? Try typing something specific to the page you want to visit, e.g. a name, into the Location Bar and hit EnterReturn. This will take you to the top result in Google for that term. Also see Searching.

Clicking a link

Most web pages contain links you can click to move to other pages.

1. Move the mouse pointer until it changes to a pointing finger. This happens whenever the pointer is over a link. Most links are underlined text, but buttons and pictures can also be links.

2. Click the link once. While the network locates the link's page, status messages will appear at the bottom of the window.

Retracing your steps

There are several ways to revisit pages:

* To go back or forward one page, click the Back or Forward button.

* To go back or forward more than one page, click the small triangles on the Back and Forward buttons. You'll see a list of pages you've recently visited; to return to a page, choose it from the list.

* To see a list of any URLs you've typed into the Location Bar, click the down arrow at the right end of the Location Bar. To view a page, choose it from the list.

* To choose from pages you've visited during the current session, open the History menu and use the list in the bottom section of the menu.

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Firefox 2:

To choose from pages you've visited during the past several sessions, open the History menu and choose Show in Sidebar. You will see the History Sidebar. The History Sidebar displays a list of folders. Clicking the folders displays subfolders or titles of web pages. You can click a page's title to view that page.

Firefox 2

Firefox 3:

To choose from pages you've visited during the past several sessions, open the History menu and choose Show All History. The Library window displays a list of folders. Clicking the folders displays subfolders or titles of web pages. You can click a page's title to view that page.

Firefox 3

Stopping and reloading

If a page is loading too slowly or you no longer wish to view a page, click the Stop button.

To reload the current page or to get the most up-to-date version, click the Reload button or press Ctrl Cmd+ R.

Tabbed browsing

When you visit more than one web page at a time, you can use Tabbed Browsing to navigate the Web faster and easier.

Tabbed browsing lets you open several web pages within a single Firefox window, each displaying in its own tab. This frees up space on your desktop since you don't have to have a window open for every web page you're currently visiting. You can open, close, and reload web pages conveniently in one place without having to switch to another window.

For more info, see Tabbed browsing.

Using the Sidebar

The Sidebar is an area on the left side of the screen that you can use for viewing bookmarks or history. Extensions may add new ways to use the Sidebar as well.

To view an item in the Sidebar, select View > Sidebar. From there you can select the Sidebar tab you want.

Searching

Searching the web

Searching for web pages on a particular topic is as easy as typing a few words into Firefox's Search Bar.

For example, if you want to find information about the world cup:

1. Click in the Search Bar.

2. Type the phrase world cup. Your typing replaces any text currently in the search bar.

3. Hit EnterReturn to search.

Search results for "world cup" appear in the Firefox window.

Selecting search engine

You can switch the search engine by clicking on its icon and selecting the search engine of your choice. Some search engines, like Google, search the whole web; others, like Amazon.com, only search specific sites.

Manage search engines

Click on the icon of the search engine and select Manage Search Engines... to add, reorder, remove, or restore the default search engines. Select a search engine and click the appropriate button to to move it around within the list or remove it. You can install new search engines by clicking the Get more search engines… link.

Searching