How do I edit HTML source code with Firefox?

July 6, 2004 6:11 AM

HTML editing: IE6 has been hijacked once too often so I've moved over to Firefox. But it's just not the same. When building websites in IE6, it was the work of a moment to bring up the html source in notepad, save it and refresh the open window to check the changes. Firefox is having none of this. Any suggestions?
posted by jonathanbell to Computers & Internet (8 answers total)

I think you want something like this extension. It will let you change "View Source" to use notepad.
posted by smackfu at 6:28 AM on July 6, 2004

Response by poster: Thanks, but that just brings up a blank page in notepad when I right click and select 'mozex' - 'View Page Source'. What am I missing here?
posted by jonathanbell at 6:46 AM on July 6, 2004

Mozedit will let you launch an editor for local html files from the browser... but I'm not sure I get your question, is it just because you don't want to open notepad first? I mean, once you've got a file open in notepad, you certainly can save it and refresh the window in firefox just fine.

More importantly, Firefox has the awesome web developer extensions, which make analyzing your HTML a lot easier.
posted by malphigian at 7:08 AM on July 6, 2004

You have to put %t after notepad.exe in the view source box. Very intuitive, I know.

Which kind of works, except it doesn't seem to on files in directories with spaces in their names. Who lets these people write code?

(The Firefox bug to add this feature is 172817)
posted by smackfu at 7:22 AM on July 6, 2004

jonathon - you could try using the launchy extension. it adds a submenu that includes notepad to the right click menu in firefox... it's one click more than opening notepad in ie6, but it's not too bad.
posted by t r a c y at 7:26 AM on July 6, 2004

Heh. The nice thing about firefox is that, if you're any good at writing css and valid xhtml, the pages will look the way you see them in your head. And when something looks wrong it is more likely a mistake you need to correct than a bug in the browser. Unlike IE. Where you can write flawless code and spend an hour trying to figure out why it looks like crap. Of course with Firefox you later have to go back later and add a bunch of ugly hacks for IE, but at least you're standards compliant first and IE friendly second. Firefox rocks for doing web development. Also, check out this extension. I don't know how I lived without it.
posted by Grod at 7:41 AM on July 6, 2004

Response by poster: Thanks for all your answers - Launchy is perfect. When I'm building a site that's sitting on my hard disk I just need quick access to the html so I can tweak things as I go along, and bring up multiple pages and cut and paste bits of code. It's an antiquated way of doing things, but it seems to work.

Thanks again!
posted by jonathanbell at 7:42 AM on July 6, 2004

Which kind of works, except it doesn't seem to on files in directories with spaces in their names.

You probably just need to quote it: notepad '%t'
posted by sfenders at 11:52 AM on July 6, 2004