Scroll control?

January 4, 2008 1:24 PM

How do I make Firefox scroll down only half a page (i.e., half the height of my screen) when I hit the spacebar, rather than down a full page?
posted by bbranden1 to Computers & Internet (9 answers total)

Best answer: Well, since no one else is answering, I can get you part way there. As far as I know, there's no way to change the space-pagedown function to half-pagedown.

But there are a few other options that could get you close. The first one to come to mind is a bookmarklet of something like:

javascript:self.scrollBy(0,300);

which would scroll down 300 pixels. You could bookmark that to your toolbar and instead of pressing space, you just click that.

Not ideal, but much closer. I would imagin there's an add-on somewhere that maps key commands to bookmarks, so instead of clicking, you'd do a ctrl-~ or something, but I don't know what that add-on is. (Not my forte.)

Anyone else know?
posted by ochenk at 2:56 PM on January 4, 2008

I guess mf doesn't like the inline js code.

Copy the text, "Bookmark this page", paste as the location, yadda, yadda.
posted by ochenk at 2:58 PM on January 4, 2008

Best answer: The mozless add-on gives you key bindings with functions like the Unix command less (i.e. more). It defaults to D for the half-scroll, though.
posted by dhartung at 3:41 PM on January 4, 2008

Response by poster: All new stuff to me and very interesting. Thanks! Would there be a way to move this command (either in javascript or as a bookmarklet) to a button that would sit on the toolbar, so that I can just rest my cursor on the button and half-page my way thru a document by repetitive clicking?
posted by bbranden1 at 4:34 PM on January 4, 2008

All new stuff to me and very interesting. Thanks! Would there be a way to move this command (either in javascript or as a bookmarklet) to a button that would sit on the toolbar, so that I can just rest my cursor on the button and half-page my way thru a document by repetitive clicking?
--bbranden1

The javascript IS the bookmarklet.

The bookmarks tool bar will do what you want.
posted by philomathoholic at 6:49 PM on January 4, 2008

It really seems like there ought to be a way to do this. I was about to ask the same question once I had a chance. There isn't any variable in about:config controlling this?
posted by vegetableagony at 7:12 PM on January 4, 2008

Best answer: "Would there be a way to move this command to a button?"

Yes. Bookmark this mf page and place it in the "bookmarks toolbar folder." A button to this mf page should appear just under the back/forward buttons. If not, make sure there's a check mark next to "bookmarks toolbar" under view->toolbars. Now you should see it. Right-click on the button and change the url in the location box to the javascript code above.

That's it. Anytime you click on that button, the page will scroll down 300 pixels.
posted by ochenk at 9:38 PM on January 4, 2008

Response by poster: Very cool. Thanks ochenk. I got it to work in the bookmarks drop down menu. However, when I bring up bookmarks on its own toolbar (via the view menu), the tool bar is blank no matter how many new bookmarks I add (and the new ones do show up in the bookmarks drop down menu). Any advice on that unexpected problem?
posted by bbranden1 at 5:39 PM on January 5, 2008

Response by poster: Ooops, found my problem was adding the bookmark to the bookmark menu rather than the "bookmark toolbar" menu. And now it works great.
Thanks!!
posted by bbranden1 at 5:47 PM on January 5, 2008