It is a pretty solid walkthrough that unfortunately lacks images to go along with the article. The tips and tweaks are divided into these five subjects:

• Give tabs more space
• Prevent unwanted close
• Change tab logic
• Use hotkeys
• Show tabs in full screen mode

Most of the tips and tweaks describe Opera settings and options that can be changed to make it easier and more convenient to work with many tabs in the Opera browser. Probably the most useful tip for a “minimal user interface” type of user like me is the description of how to remove interface elements from the toolbar to provide more space for the tabs.

The article is worth a read for all users who work regularly or partially with the Opera web browser.

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Windows Tabifier takes the concept a step further by breaking out of the Windows Explorer limitation. It can be used to put any application or window that is currently running in a tab. It will create a new window if the process is initiated and add all selected applications, processes, folders and files into tabs in there.

Windows Tabifier provides two ways of adding windows to the tabbed browsing interface. The first is by using the System Tray icon to move open windows into the interface. This can be done in just a few clicks and has to be done at the beginning to create a tabbed browsing window.

The second option is to drag files or folders into the tabbed browsing interface once it has been created. This will automatically create a new tab in the interface.

You can browse in the interface by hovering the mouse over the tabs or by using the keyboard shortcut [CTRL 1-9].

It is possible to create multiple windows for tabbed browsing, for example one that contains all Windows Explorer folders, one for Internet and one for multimedia. The Taskbar icon will always display the icon of the active Window in the Taskbar. Minimizing the tabbed browsing window will move it into the System tray. Windows can naturally be released from the tabbed browsing interface at any time.

Windows Tabifier provides the means to tidy up the Windows Taskbar by joining multiple windows into one window. Users who have to cope with tiny computer screens and those who like their desktop to be organized and clean all the time should give this application a try.

The software program is Open Source and portable. It does require a version of the Microsoft .net Framework but the software developer fails to mention which. It was tested with the Microsoft .net Framework 3.5 SP1 on a Windows XP SP3 test computer system.

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A blank tab however is not useful at all. A better solution would be to open another website or service in the blank tab, something that is quick to load, is usually the right choice and does not delay the process for to long if the user wants to do something different with the tab.

A tab is usually created when the user wants to open a new url or search for something. He could do CTRL T and enter the url that he wants to visit. What if he uses a search engine most of the time that way? What if the search engine could be loaded automatically when a new tab is created?

That is the basic principle of the New Tab URL extension for Firefox. The user can select a default url that opens when a new blank tab is created. This can the his homepage, the current page, the blank (default) page or a custom url.

The custom url is probably the only option that makes sense in the options. The user could pick Google, Yahoo, a specialized search engine, his favorite message board or online shop to open whenever he creates a new tab in Firefox.

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It’s however not comfortable to surf that way and users who regularly open more tabs than their screen size can take could find the Tab Kit extension for Firefox useful. One of the main features of that Firefox add-on is the ability to span Firefox tabs across multiple rows. While that opens up new space for additional websites it also means that the remaining screen estate for the active website is reduced.

While that is definitely one of the main features of the Tab Kit extension several others are available which also deserve to be listed. The tab bar can be moved from the horizontal row to the sidebar which is an excellent option for uses with widescreen monitors or large monitors in general.

Tabs can be grouped which is another interesting feature. Grouped tabs are being displayed in the same color or next to each other in the vertical tab menu. The add-on makes use of colors not only to display grouped tabs but also tabs that are active, unread or protected. This option can be disabled, it really does get colorful if you keep the default settings and that might not be something for everyone.

Other features of this excellent Firefox add-on include:

• Sorting Tabs in numerous ways
• Mouse Gestures
• Tab Dragging
• Positioning tabs
• Setting the minimum width and close button preference

Tab Kit provides several useful features for users that work with a large amount of tabs on a regular basis. It offers many options that more or less regulate every aspect of the tabbed browsing in Firefox.

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The extension has so many options that it is hard to focus on some that could be worth mentioning. Playing around with it revealed several ones that I did activate and like. You may specify a minimum and maximum width for all tabs, changing the default Firefox values of 100 to 250 pixels to different values. I have great success with 80 to 150 pixels which should be enough to identify most websites.

It is furthermore possible to change the erratic behavior that downloads sometimes open in blank tabs which do not disappear after the download finishes. Tab Mix Plus is able to prevent this from happening. You can select which events should open a new tab and which should not, I have selected to open all javascript popups in tabs, all links that normally open in new windows, all links from other applications and when I want to open bookmarks.

You may also set the behavior for mouse clicks. Define actions when double-clicking, middle-clicking, shift-clicking, ctrl-clicking and alt-clicking a tab and the tab bar. Actions range from closing, duplicating and reloading tabs to merging and protecting them.

Unread tabs and the current tab can be displayed in different colors and fonts to distinguish them from the rest of the open tabs. A progress meter will be displayed in tabs that are currently loaded which is a nice feature as well.

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