QuickProxy has become a Recommended Addon

QuickProxy is now a Recommended addon

QuickProxy is now a Recommended addon

It’s been a long time since QuickProxy was first launched, and apart from some cosmetic and behavior changes the extension remains as minimal as I can get it. I’m happy to announce that on the 11th of September, QuickProxy became a Recommended addon in its category.

While I was having a look around the site to see what this had changed, when viewing the section for Privacy & Security addons, I saw that QuickProxy was also on top for the Top Rated addon.

When I started on this project, I just wanted to get something as simple as possible out, as all I needed the extension for was for one purpose, to swap between the proxy and direct internet connection. After I had completed it, I decided that it was probably not that uncommon that people were in this situation, which is what pushed me to release this to the Mozilla addon site.

The original versions of QuickProxy looked very basic, with the preferences being just the proxy type that you wanted to select. Eventually requests came in about adding some behaviour on the browser launch, which seemed fair enough to me, as quite often I had fired up my browser, forgetting that I had the proxy enabled, and finding the sites I usually go to not working.

The next complaint was the icons, as I wasn’t the most artistic person. The icons have changed from the originals, which I had to admit were quite appalling, to the third icon set that you see in the preferences now. Some users wanted brighter icons, and this is when I introduced the option for different icon sets, to try to please as many people as possible.

As the extension is today, there are a few more things that I would like to change with how it works, but unfortunately my free time that I have to implement these is very limited. Currently I’m just focusing on keeping it up to date, and fixing any issues that come in (there is still one open issue, which involves the automatic proxy configuration, which is proving to be quite annoying to try to resolve).

I never imagined I’d get the number of users that I have today, and it is through your support and reviews that I have been able to achieve what QuickProxy is today. As always, I appreciate any feedback on the extension, and feel free to send any constructive criticism that you have, as the more people tell me the more I can try to adapt it to suit as many users as possible. As my current user base is averaging around 65,000 daily users, I know that not all changes will be welcome to everyone, which is why I will not be changing the base behaviour of the extension, and any future changes will be on an opt-in basis, with the options in the current preferences window.

Thank you all for your continued support to this addon, and hopefully I’ll be able to get some free time soon to work on the features some of you have requested.

Thursday, September 24th, 2009 QuickProxy

25 comments on “QuickProxy has become a Recommended Addon”

  1. biggy says:

    Yeah DL-ed the addon, activated the proxy but then checked my location at IP chicken, dosn’t change, wtf am i doing wrong or did u do wrong?

    • Ozzie says:

      You will need to configure a proxy yourself inside FireFox before the addon will do anything. The addon only selects the proxy type used, and will not provide one for you.

  2. flytwokites says:

    I like this addon.
    It is better to add a keyboard shortcut to enable/disable proxy.

    • Ozzie says:

      Keyboard shortcuts to trigger QuickProxy’s actions will hopefully be implemented soon. I’m trying to correct as many issues as I can (currently outstanding is the event listeners and the automatic proxy configuration on the launch of the browser) before I look at adding new features.

  3. Lestat says:

    I have been using this add-on for a while I have to say it is great. It would be even better if it provided the ability to set multiple proxies that can be chosen depending your needs. I have 3 proxies I use on a daily basis and I have to remember to change the proxy each time. So, I would be delighted to see this in a future release. In any case, the on/off feature is definitely nice to have.

    Keep up the good work!

  4. francois says:

    I am a big fan, but still a bit sad it is not already available in 3.6 beta 3 yet. Have you planned to add 3.6 support soon?

    • Ozzie says:

      I’ve upgraded the compatible versions with the extension that is on the Mozilla site. Sadly I’ve been unable to complete the new build before my holiday, but the latest release all seems to be working correctly for me in the new beta’s.

  5. alireza says:

    hello sir

    momently i use quickProxy to switch on/off my proxy

    so i need to have more facilities on this addone

    1. i need a keyboard Shortcut that works as clicking on “P” icon
    2. i need more proxy setting to switch between theme like “proxy setting 1” “proxy setting 2” & . . . that be customizable on “quick proxy” settings

    thanks so much

    • Ozzie says:

      Currently I’m working on the keyboard shortcut, and I’m making a little headway with that.

      For the 2nd point, it depends on what you are after with whether I would implement the change. Currently the only other option that I was thinking of putting in was make a menu accessible by the icon that you could quick select what proxy type that you wanted. Currently I won’t touch any of the actual settings for proxies, so if you wanted an option that saved your proxy configurations, and allowed you to swap between those two, then unfortunately it won’t be implemented with QuickProxy as it is currently.

  6. mcdmx says:

    Great plugin. Would be even greater if it would work in Thunderbird too πŸ˜‰

  7. jan says:

    Hi, someone’s done an addon that “… is a very simple extension for Mozilla Firefox which has the functionality of enable/disable proxy in a single click.” .
    Strangely, it too is called quickProxy (lowercase p). And he didn’t know? I think you should know.
    Anyway, keep up the good work!

  8. Louis Bouchard says:

    Hello,

    Great work that you’ve done with QP, congratulations ! But I’m hitting what might be a bug : even with the proxy switched off, I’m seeing side effects depending on how QP is configured (automatic .vs. manual setup).

    For instance, if proxy is off & automatic configuration (URL) is chosen, CITRIX won’t start correctly. I know that this might be a CITRIX issue, but I expect no proxy interference when QP switches the proxy off.

    Any place where I can fill a bug report ?

    Kind regards and continue the good work.

    • Ozzie says:

      I’m not entirely sure how Citrix runs with this issue, but QuickProxy shouldn’t interfere with anything. It toggles the Firefox preferences the same way as if you went into the preferences and switched the proxy off. If you have further details that I can use to chase it up, feel free to submit a bug report via the form at:
      https://ozzie.io/quickproxy/

  9. vaddi says:

    I use QuickProxy for one year. Because i often have to forward over ssh, this plug-in have made it easy to switch to socks ports.

    Maybe it would be nice to reload all tab’s that still open on activate or deactivate QuickProxy.

    In my case i have to do so, because my shell connection keep its session still open, as long as connections are use forward. It seems that is not possible to forward single tabs only, but how many users still have the use for πŸ˜‰

    greetings from vaddi

    • Ozzie says:

      If I were to implement something like this, I would probably include just a button (say in a popup menu over the icon) that allowed you to refresh all the tabs that are currently open.

      Unless I get more people asking for it though, the other additions in progress will take priority over it.

  10. eder says:

    This is a very useful add-on, thank you for it. I was using it today and felt the need to be able to let the proxy active in some tabs and inactive in others. What do you think about that?

    Thanks again and keep the good work!

    • Ozzie says:

      I may have a look into doing something like this, but I’m not sure how well I’d be able to get this running, if at all.

      The scope of it sounds like it would be good in one of the more complex proxy extensions, as my knowledge of how Firefox works is limited, as is the time I have to extend it.

  11. Greg says:

    If you have more than one window open and click the status bar icon, its’ appearance isn’t changed on all windows.

    • Ozzie says:

      It doesn’t currently update instantly (I haven’t worked out how to do this nicely, so if anyone has any pointers, they would be appreciated), but when you actually focus on a separate instance it should update the icon. So if I have Window 2 selected, and swap the proxy with the icon, Window 1 will still show the old state, until I select Window 1, which will then update it against the current settings.

      • Greg says:

        @Ozzie

        I don’t see that happening, if I activate QP in Window 1, then focus window 2, the icon doesn’t update.

        You might have a look at Firebug or Greasemonkey, they both update immediately in multiple windows.

        • Ozzie says:

          I’ll look into this further to see why that is occuring, as it should definitely be working in the way I mentioned. What OS/Firefox Version do you run?

  12. iro picci says:

    Hi Ozzie,
    I found your add-on very useful ‘cos of the Website on which I have to work every day: it downloads properly sometimes with the proxy as gateway and sometimes without it, so I often have to change this setting in order to do my work so yeah, that’s recommended to me πŸ™‚
    Just for fun (and also for the simplicity of it) I’ve written the localization file for Italian language and added a fourth set of icons maybe more lovable… Of sure I haven’t redistributed my modified jar, so can I email it to you just to have a look at it?
    P.S.: my apologies for my not-ever-correct english πŸ˜›

  13. Jad says:

    Quickproxy works in Thunderbird 3 with very minor changes:

    http://tiptt.blogspot.com/2010/02/porting-firefox-extension-to.html

    works a charm.

    • Ozzie says:

      Thanks for the link, I’ll look into it further shortly and hopefully a Thunderbird compatible version wont be far off.

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