I’ve seen a lot of blog posts recently proposing Google Chrome as the browser of choice for Netbooks. This is simply because of the amount of screen real estate the various browsers use up adding toolbars etc to their user interface.
It’s certainly true that Chrome scores very highly in this regard if you intend to simply install the basic version out of the box. However, one of the main reasons for moving away from the ubiquitous 
Internet Explorer is the massive range of customisations available for both Chrome and (of course) Firefox.
Firefox Still Rules The Roost
Unfortunately there are still a lot of areas that cannot be adjusted in Chrome. This certainly applies to the layout and size of the main toolbars at the top. Sure, there are plenty of ‘Themes’ available but these really just change the colours and add some graphics.
On the other hand, Firefox Themes have the ability to totally change the UI of Firefox and for that reason, it’s still tops!
Maximise Screen Space
So, the idea here is to leave as much space available for Web-Pages as possible. There are a number of ways to do this in Firefox. I am not professing to have the one true solution to this problem, but I am pretty pleased with the result I have!
After a clean install of Firefox 3.6, these are the extensions I’ve added:
- Classic Compact Theme
- Classic Compact Theme Options
- FoxiFrame Basic
- Greasemonkey
- Hide Bookmarks Bar
- Omnibar
- Speed Dial
With these, I have created a fully loaded Firefox install that can be reduced to just one toolbar.
Classic Compact Theme/Options
These two complimentary add-ons reduce toolbars and icons to their absolute minimum. They also provide an option to reduce all the usual menus (File, Edit, View etc) into one icon with a drop down menu instead.
FoxiFrame Basic
This add on removes the title bar from the very top of the window. There are several choices for where to put the window controls (I just dropped them down to the top toolbar). It also offers an option to move the tab bar to the very top like Chrome and there are tweaks available for the status bar at the bottom.
Greasemonkey
This is an add-on that allows you to modify specific web pages. I have included it here because I used it to make my GMail interface much more Netbook Friendly.
Omnibar
This add on combines the functions of the Address and Search boxes into one.
Speed Dial
This one is probably not essential but I’ve certainly found it useful. It offers an alternative way of managing your most used bookmarks which can be constantly available in a single tab.
Conclusions
Chrome continues to develop at a phenomenal rate. It’s fast and it’s quickly developing a huge number of extensions and customisations. At the moment though, there is no way to change the size of the toolbars and browser frame.
It is smaller than Firefox out of the box but with just a couple of tweaks, Firefox can be made a lot smaller. Take your pick!
References:
- Get Firefox – http://getfirefox.com
- Firefox Add Ons — https://addons.mozilla.org
- Google Chrome — http://www.google.com/chrome
New on Tintent: Firefox – Netbook Remix http://cbeg.es/7k