Tag: firefox

How to Download Trailers from Apple.com

If you are like me, you find streaming trailers from Apple is a pain in the ass. I still prefer having the trailer locally and playing it locally, even if it means a bit of screwing around. Here’s a quick way to download trailers:

1. Install the Firefox web browser
2. Install the Greasemonkey add-on for Firefox
3. Install wget for Windows (most Linux distros will have it installed already)
4. Add the Apple Trailer Download script to your greasemonkey distribution.
5. Enable greasemonkey
6. Go to an Apple trailer page, like The Slammin’ Salmon page
7. Note in the bottom right you’ll get a little window with a bunch of links to the various versions – looks like this:

apple-greasemonkey

Right click, copy link location for the version you want

8. Open a command prompt and fire up wget thusly:

wget -U QuickTime [url of trailer]
You need to specify the -U parameter (User-Agent) as Apple rejects any requests for trailers that are not from QuickTime.

10. Realise that this method violates the Apple.com Terms of Use and stop doing it.

Extended Link Properties for Firefox v3.x

Ever looked at a link to a file online and wanted to find out how big the file is? Sure, if you’re hardcore you can fire up a command prompt and just do “wget –spider –debug [url]” or whatever, but surely you should just be able to right click on it and go to Properties and get a file size, just like in Windows, right?!

Well, the Extended Link Properties add-on fore Firefox is what I’ve always used to do exactly that. Unfortunately it hasn’t been updated for a billion years and doesn’t work in newer versions of Firefox.

I’ve been using the Nightly Tester Tools to force compatibility (because it’s just a version requirement) but I finally got bored with it constantly breaking every new Firefox version. I’ve dissected the add-on and re-built it into a new XPI which I have dubbed ‘Extended Link Properties v1.2.4’.

Anyone wanting to download it can do so here (md5sum: 03e3e278c2d8b921401cf1a8b68efc45), though you’ll need to manually install it at the moment by downloading the .xpi file, then in Firefox simply go to the File Menu then hit Open File and browse to the XPI. You’ll get the usual notice.

I have emailed Torisugari, the original developer of the add-on, to see if he’s still around. I’ll try and get it on the official extension site at some point if he replies.

Update: Torisugari has replied and pointed out the file is tri-licensed already under MPL/GPL/LGPL. He also points out that this extension will only useful up to version 3.5.x of Firefox – after that the Firefox developers have decided to remove support for the Properties dialog. If you use Properties and/or Extended Link Properties, you should head over and add your voice to that bug report.

As a result of that I’ve changed the v1.2.4 build of ELP that I put together to only support up to v3.5.x of Firefox.

Firefox 3 Beta 4 Memory Improvements

One of the big complaints about Firefox amongst hardcore nerds has been the memory leaking issue (despite frequent rebuttal that it is by design, or whatever). The Mozilla guys have made this a big focus of Firefox 3 and the new beta 4 shows the improvements mentioned in this post by Pavlov, one of the developers. If you want to test beta 4 without blowing away or risking your current Firefox installation check out the portableapps.com build, which will let you run it independently.

It is noticeably faster for me and definitely is looking nice. Not sure if I’m keen on the new address bar, but I’ll give it a go.