Firefox keyboard shortcuts

Since my short term memory is totally shot, every time I learn something new, I have to write it down.  Since some of the stuff I learn may be useful to others, I sometimes write it here.

Being that I’m remarkably lazy, I don’t like making making the extra effort required to move my arm 8 inches from my keyboard to my mouse to perform tasks while in Firefox.  This is where keyboard shortcuts come in.  There is a great list of Firefox keyboard shortcuts on the mozilla site.  Some highlights:

• Open a new tab: Ctrl-T
• Close the active tab: Ctrl-W
• Undo close tab: Ctrl-Shift-T
• Next tab: Ctrl-Tab
• Previous tab: Ctrl-Shift-Tab
• Select the location bar: Alt-D or Ctrl-L

That last one is pretty useful when combined with Firefox quick searches.  A quick search can be defined by right-clicking inside a search box and choosing “Add a Keyword for this Search…” from the context menu.  You then get the bookmark dialog that looks like this:

You type in a name for the quick search and a keyword.  Once this is out of the way, if you go to the location bar, type your keyword then a space followed by search terms, the search will be performed.

For example, if I associate a “g” keyword with a google search, I can hit Alt-D to get to the location bar, type “g tony triolo” and I get a google results page with results about me (and a bunch of other Tony Triolos).

If you have the google toolbar installed, you can get to the search box on the toolbar by hitting Alt-G.  This keyboard shortcut for the google toolbar is not one that is easily found elsewhere on the interwebs.  If you don’t have google toolbar, or you prefer using the built in Firefox search bar (at the upper right), you can hit Ctrl-K to put the cursor in there.