News, info, and opinion by Mac users, for Mac users.

August 28, 2008

software

Ubiquity: new Firefox extension is, by definition, everywhere

Posted Aug. 28, ’08, 9:12 AM PT by Dan Moren
Category | Software

ubiquity.jpgYou can do a lot with the web: email people, find maps, locate a new place to live, play games, etc. But for all that the web has progressed in the last decade, it’s still surprisingly limited in some ways. Mozilla Labs’s new Firefox extension, Ubiquity, aims to change that.

For those familiar with Quicksilver, Ubiquity is a similar concept that’s tied directly to Firefox. It lets you take information from one place and then easily move it to another place. Think of it as the glue that lets you combine information in new and useful ways. For example, Ubiquity makes it easy to grab a map and insert it into your email, or easily search Amazon or Wikipedia for information, and a whole lot more. Ubiquity can also be extended by third-party developers, which is good, because at the moment, it only integrates with a finite number of sources.

It’s kind of tricky to explain Ubiquity in text alone, so I highly recommend you check out this demo of the software in action. It’s narrated by Aza Raskin, who’s not only the Head of User Experience at Mozilla Labs, but also the son of the late human-computer interface expert Jef Raskin, who headed up the original Macintosh project. While I don’t know if Ubiquity will give me a reason to switch to Firefox, the demo definitely has a couple of those “Wow. Why is that so annoying to do?” moments that’ll grab your attention.


Leave a comment

 



Visit other IDG sites: