43Secret settings and the best extensions
Issue 632 • 25 May – 7 June 2022BEST ADD-ON FOR... Customising Wikipedia
Wikiwand
Chromium & Firefox
http://www.snipca.com/41819
Wikipedia is a brilliant free resource, but
while its articles are interesting to read,
the site’s text-heavy layout can feel dull
to browse. To make the encyclopedia
more engaging, install the magical add-on
Wikiwand, which transforms Wikipedia’s
appearance with an attractive, modern
look and fonts. This includes expanding
images to create large cover photos and
converting each article’s Contents list
into a convenient side menu. You can
see thumbnail previews of pages whenyou hover your cursor over links, download
articles as PDFs and view pop-up definitions
when you press Ctrl and click words. Click
the Personalize cog on the toolbar (see
screenshot) for further customisationoptions, such as changing the text size
and layout, and switching between light
and dark mode. To disable Wikiwand and
switch back to standard Wikipedia, click the
W icon and choose ‘Read on Wikipedia’.If you don’t like that, try...
Modern for Wikipedia
Chromium & Firefox
http://www.snipca.com/41820
This extension applies a fresh look to
Wikipedia and makes the content easier
to read. It also lets you jump back to pages
you’ve previously viewed and find articles
faster using an enhanced search box.you can now click the settings cog in the
top-right corner and choose ‘Hide all
annotations’^3.
OPERA
Capture and crop screenshots
more easily
Opera was the first browser to
introduce a screenshot feature,
way back in 2017, and version 86
(released in April) makes this built-in tool
even more useful. As well as capturing
screenshots by clicking the Snapshot
button in the address bar, you can now
simply highlight three or more words on
a web page. This will display a pop-up
containing three options: Search, Copy
and Snapshot. Clicking the latter (see
screenshot below) will open the selected
text in Opera’s Snapshot editor, where
you can modify and apply effects to it,
before copying the text to your clipboard,
saving it as a PNG image or sharing it
via email.
Opera has also added a Crop option to
the Snapshot editor, so you can remove
unwanted elements from the screenshots
you capture. You’ll find this on the editor’s
toolbar to the right of the Text tool.
FIREFOX
Restore the classic scrollbar
in Windows 11
One small but significant change in
Firefox 100, released in early May,
narrows the scrollbar in Windows 11 until
you move your cursor over it, reducing it
to a thin line and hiding it altogether
when a page is static. This is intended to
give you more space, but if you prefer
the scrollbar’s traditional, thicker
appearance, you can restore it. Type
about:config into the address bar, press
Enter and click ‘Accept the Risk and
Continue’. Search for the preference
widget.windows.overlay-scrollbars.
enabled and double-click it to change the
value to ‘false’ (see screenshot
above). Restart Firefox and the
classic, chunky scrollbar will
be restored.BRAVE
Block web trackers
using Brave’s Shields
The best thing about Brave
(https://brave.com) is
undoubtedly its Shields feature,
which lets you block “all the
creepy stuff that tries to trackyou across the web”,
including ads, scripts,
fingerprinting and
cross-site cookies.
Version 1.38 of the
browser, which was
released in April,
simplifies Shields so you
can turn its protection
on or off (if you’re
having trouble loading a site) without
needing to configure individual settings.
Simply click the Brave lion icon to the
right of the address bar then click the
switch to disable or enable Shields.
If you want to block some elements
but not others, click ‘Advanced controls’
(see screenshot below) to display the full
set of options. You can also click ‘Filter
lists’ to choose which filters Brave uses
to block ads, trackers and online
annoyances.
Brave 1.38 also introduces the browser’s
new protection against Google’s
accelerated mobile pages (AMP).
See our Cover Feature on page 50 for
more about AMP.