Skip the navigation

The best Internet Explorer add-ins

No need to be jealous of Firefox's plug-ins, because you can get cool add-ins for IE, too

By Preston Gralla
February 13, 2008 12:00 PM ET

Computerworld - A browser by itself is a poor thing, letting you browse the Web, but little else. To get the most out of the Web, you need add-ins that give your browser plenty of extra features.

Firefox is well known for its plug-ins, but there aren't as many available for Internet Explorer. Still, you needn't feel left out in the cold. In fact, there are plenty of add-ins for IE as well.

In this article, I'll clue you in to my favorite Internet Explorer add-ins. I'll ignore the obvious ones, such as the Google Toolbar, Yahoo Toolbar or Windows Live Toolbar, because you probably already know about them. Instead, I'll concentrate on lesser-known ones that do everything from killing annoying ads, to restoring crashed browsing sessions, to grabbing video from sites like YouTube and more. Better yet, everyone one of them is free.

Quero Toolbar

The Quero Toolbar makes it easy to customize ad blocking on a site-by-site basis.
Click to view larger image

Tired of being besieged by ads, including exceedingly annoying Flash ads? Then you'll want the free Quero Toolbar, which includes a very good and customizable ad blocker. It will block just about any ad you'll come across, including banner ads, Flash animations and many others, including Google ads.

You can turn it on and off, of course, but better yet, you can customize it for individual sites, allowing ads from some sites and banning them from others. Better still, you can fine-tune it to a remarkable degree, for example, by allowing Google ads and banner ads from a particular site, but banning Flash animations.

There's more to the Quero Toolbar as well, including a nice inline search feature that jumps straight to text on a page as you type in a term, the ability to search for any word on a Web page by selecting and right-clicking it, and the ability to quickly resize windows. And plenty of included shortcut keys means that mouse-haters need to reach for their rodent less frequently than before.

IE7Pro

IE7Pro is the best Internet Explorer add-in we tested; it does everything from blocking ads, to re-opening crashed tabs and more.
Click to view larger image

For an even more comprehensive add-in, including ad blocking and much more, get the free IE7Pro. It's a remarkable add-in and has features that rival the best of Firefox plug-ins.

Like the Quero Toolbar, it will block Flash ads as well as other ads, although it doesn't give you quite as many fine-grained controls over blocking or allowing specific kinds of ads on a site-by-site basis.

The program truly shines in the way it handles tabs, and this may be its best feature. If IE7 crashes for some reason -- and as we all know, there are plenty of reasons why it crashes -- the program will automatically restore all the tabs that were open at the time of the crash. You can also automatically reopen the last tab you've closed to display the site you were visiting when you closed it. And you can reopen tabs you closed before that as well.

This freebie has so many clever features that there's no way to list them all. Here's a simple but particularly useful one: You can have the program automatically scroll down a Web page at one of three speeds. It's great for when you're reading a long Web page and don't want to have to scroll manually. Just choose the speed, and it'll scroll for you. Similarly, you can have the program autorefresh your current tab, at any interval you chose.

Settings in Feeds Plus let you read groups of feeds in a combined view, instead of one feed at a time.
Click to view larger image

There's plenty more as well, including a forms filler and a mouse gestures feature that lets you do things such as scroll up or down, close tabs and go forward or back by right-clicking the mouse and making a gesture with it.

This is clearly the best of the bunch -- it's staying in my browser.

Feeds Plus

The feed reader built into IE7 is one of its niftier features.

Make it even better with Feeds Plus, a free add-in built by members of Microsoft's RSS team. (Because Feeds Plus isn't an official Microsoft product, though, you won't get support.)



Additional Resources
Forrester Consulting - Optimizing Users and Applications in a Mobile World
WHITE PAPER
Solving application issues over the WAN requires careful consideration. Based on their independent research, Forrester Consulting offers recommendations on how to tackle application performance issues, insufficient bandwidth and the inability to quickly restore users in a disaster.

Read now.

Security KnowledgeVault
WHITE PAPER
Security is not an option. This KnowledgeVault Series offers professional advice how to be proactive in the fight against cybercrimes and multi-layered security threats; how to adopt a holistic approach to protecting and managing data; and how to hire a qualified security assessor. Make security your Number 1 priority.

Read now.

Cut Communications Costs Once and for All
WHITE PAPER
New IP-based communications systems are being deployed by small and midsized businesses at a rapid rate. Learn how these organizations are enabling faster responsiveness, creating better customer experiences, speeding office or mobile interactions, and dramatically reducing existing communications costs.

Read now.

Networking White Papers
Digital Transformation: Creating New Business Models Where Digital Meets Physical
Individuals and businesses alike are embracing the digital revolution. Social networks and digital devices are being used to engage government, businesses and civil...
Make the Connection: Better Network Connectivity Drives Transformation
Network connectivity is more than just plumbing. Leading organizations today see high-performance network connectivity as a critical enabler of competitive advantage, and not...
Virtualizing Government Infrastructure
All server virtualization solutions are not created equal. The more-with-less agenda for government agencies is tailor-made for server virtualization, which is evolving into...
Moving Service Management to SaaS
Today, organizations can enjoy similarly substantial benefi ts by migrating their IT service management functions to a software-as-a-service model. This paper shows how...
Achieving 360 Degree Network Visibility with Nimsoft
360° network visibility is critical for ensuring continuous availability of networks, servers, and applications-anything less could
have costly bottom-line implications.
All Networking White Papers
Networking Webcasts
Optimizing Networks for the Cloud
Join guest speaker, Rohit Mehra, IDC Director of Enterprise Communications Infrastructure, to explore current trends, discuss best practices for optimizing Data Center and...
Unified Communications 101
What's the best way to implement a unified communications solution for your organization?
Try the OptiView® XG on your network - FREE
The OptiView® XG is the first dedicated tablet with automated network and application analysis -- fastest way to root cause. XG raises the...
Apps QuickStart Series Part 2: Designing and Deploying SQL Server on VMware vSphere
Download this webcast to learn about the design considerations for virtualizing SQL workloads, performance and scalability information and high-availability options, as well as...
Apps QuickStart Series Part 1: Designing and Deploying Exchange 2010 on VMware vSphere
Download this webcast to learn the virtual hardware design considerations for Exchange 2010, deployment using the building block approach, options for high-availability and...
All Networking Webcasts
Newsletter Sign-Up

Receive the latest news test, reviews and trends on your favorite technology topics

Choose a newsletter
  1. View all newsletters | Privacy Policy
IT Jobs