A new build of Googlebar Lite is now available. This release contains a number of improvements, some of which use methods not available prior to Firefox 4.0. As such, Googlebar Lite no longer includes support for Firefox 3.x. Here’s the full list of changes. Let me know if you spot a problem in this release.

• Native secure search should now work for the following top-level domains: google.co.uk, google.fr, and google.de
• Secure image searches can now be performed
• Added google.cz and google.si to the list of top-level domains
• The minimum supported Firefox version has been changed from 3.6 to 4.0
• Googlebar Lite no longer overrides the built-in toolbar customization function
• Removed obsolete contents.rdf files from each localization folder, reducing overall file size
• Bug Fix: Googlebar Lite is now initialized properly after adding the main Googlebar Lite toolbar item during toolbar customization
• Bug Fix: Googlebar Lite is now shut down properly after removing the main Googlebar Lite toolbar item during toolbar customization
• Bug Fix: Errors should no longer be thrown after removing the main Googlebar Lite toolbar item during toolbar customization
• Bug Fix: The routine for migrating old preferences should no longer be called on every startup
• Bug Fix: Updated redirection rules for several items in the Google Links menu, as well as when clicking toolbar buttons with no search terms, when the use secure search option is enabled
• Bug Fix: The “site to use” menu item in the Googlebar Lite options dialog should now be properly initialized on new installs

Why have one CoLT update when you can have two? A second release has just been pushed out, with the following minor improvements:

• Improved the way percent signs can be escaped. You can now specify either ‘%%’ or ‘\%’ to get a literal percent character.
• Added logic to clear all custom formats if the extensions.colt.prefs_version setting gets cleared in about:config. Clearing this value is a handy way to reset to the default custom formats.

A new build of CoLT is now available. Changes in this release include the following:

• Added the capability to specify access-key accelerators for custom format context menu items. Existing custom formats will have no key assigned; you must manually set them if upgrading from a previous version.
• Added the capability to insert a percent sign into a given custom format (simply escape the percent sign with a backslash character).
• Replaced the default FuseTalk custom format with the somewhat more prevalent Markdown format.

Let me know if you spot something wrong with this new build.

After thinking about it for a while, I’ve decided to remove the Software section of this website. The applications that were posted were all relatively ancient, and saw little (if any) download traffic.

The contact form at this site has been restored. If you see any additional problems with it, please let me know by leaving a comment on this post.

I am aware that the contact form at this site is broken (though I’m not sure why). Until I get some time to fix it, if you have a bug report or question, simply send me an email at: removed

My apologies for the inconvenience.

A new build of CoLT is now available, fixing a problem in the custom format translation routine. Links (or any other text) that included encoded characters (%BC for example) could become malformed. Version 2.5.5 corrects this issue. As always, if you see problems, let me know.

A new build of CoLT is now available, bringing the following changes along with it:

• Added Unicode support (custom formats can now include extended characters)
• Added a new custom format variable for inserting tab characters (%B)
• Options are now stored under the more appropriate “extensions.” branch
• Removed a few extraneous menu updates during initialization
• Removed the obsolete contents.rdf files from each localization folder, reducing overall file size
• Changed the minVersion from 1.5 to 3.6
• Changed the maxVersion to 15.*
• Bug Fix: Several registered event listeners were not being removed on shutdown

Let me know if you see any problems with this release.

Since the demise of the official Google toolbar for Firefox, I’ve been getting a number of requests to add the “form auto-fill” and “form spell checking” features from that official toolbar to Googlebar Lite. I will not add either feature to this extension, simply because they are beyond the scope of the extension’s purpose. Neither feature has anything to do with searching the web, which is the sole purpose of Googlebar Lite. If you want these two features, you need to look elsewhere.

Keep in mind that Googlebar Lite existed long before Google offered an official toolbar for Firefox. I created Googlebar Lite as a light-weight alternative to the Googlebar, not as a response to anything Google did. My primary goal with Googlebar Lite has been, and always will be, to keep it as small and bloat-free as possible. Adding features that have nothing to do with using Google’s search platform only add bloat. As such, I will not be implementing them here.

The past two releases had a pretty severe bug impacting people who search in languages that use extended characters. I have resolved the problem, and version 4.8.2 is now available. My apologies for all these bugs. With as much code as I updated, stuff was bound to fall through the cracks, as we’ve now seen. If you spot any more problems, please let me know.

This will be the last version that supports Firefox 3.6.