J
Jesse Ruderman
squarefree.com · Personal blog · on HN since 2007
Jesse Ruderman, a Mozilla developer, runs a site of bookmarklets and small web tools, plus notes on browser security.
What HN saysHN commenters recommend his bookmarklets, still working in current browsers despite no updates, especially "zap colors", and link his page for making CSS bookmarklets.
60HN people shared it
51linked it in comments
11stories submitted
143story points
2 years agolast shared
2007people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1Bookmarklets for Zapping Web Annoyances21 people · 1 points · first shared 2008 · discussion on HN
- 2Bookmarklets5 people · first shared 2011
- 3Webdevel4 people · first shared 2010
- 4Race conditions in security dialogs; why you must wait before installing addons3 people · 1 points · first shared 2011 · discussion on HN
- 5Sort any table by column and other useful bookmarklets3 people · 1 points · first shared 2010 · 1 comments on HN
- 6Forms3 people · first shared 2009
- 7Pagelinks2 people · first shared 2010
- 8Color2 people · first shared 2013
- 9Fuzzing talk at the mozilla summit2 people · first shared 2010
- 10Releasing jsfunfuzz and DOMFuzz1 people · 118 points · first shared 2015 · 14 comments on HN
- 11Fuzzing TraceMonkey1 people · 10 points · first shared 2009 · discussion on HN
- 12Ideas for ad-blockers that improve incentives for web advertisers1 people · 4 points · first shared 2011 · discussion on HN
- 13Winning an election with 22% of the popular vote1 people · 2 points · first shared 2016 · 1 comments on HN
- 14Detailed list of new features in Firefox 31 people · 2 points · first shared 2007 · discussion on HN
- 15Lithium: automated testcase reduction tool1 people · 2 points · first shared 2016 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
fabianholzer · 2024-02-10
Copy your favorite classless css framework into this: https://www.squarefree.com/userstyles/make-bookmarklet.html - drag the bookmarklet into your favorite bar, and there you are :)
body { max-width: 9in; }
Could be a minimalistic starting point ;)
notRobot · 2020-06-07
I love bookmarklets. There are many fantastic ones here: https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/
They haven't been updated in a while but they work perfectly in latest FF (and Chrome I suppose).
pasbesoin · 2015-12-27
Bookmarklets still have their place. Quickly tweaking page colors is one of them.
Here's a classic bookmarklet quick reference. (Though I have a few of my own; don't be afraid to modify to suit your taste/need.)
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/
skrause · 2015-06-15
I recommend the "zap colors" bookmarklet from https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
It simply changes all colors so that text is black-on-white, but leaves everything else unchanged.
srathi · 2015-06-06
I use the following bookmarklet for this purpose. [1]
[1] https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html#zap_colors
jsnell · 2014-05-16
Yes, but that's color scheme of half the internet these days so you just have to deal with it :-/ I recommend this bookmarklet: https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html#zap_colors
mixmastamyk · 2013-02-27
Depends on the typical and current conditions of the viewer--however few people realize it. Those that do use f.lux or one of the others.
For example, if the viewer sits in an office under 50 florescent lights, dark on light is best (e.g. Excel-jockies). This viewer "can't imagine any other way!" I often wonder how these people survived before Windows.
If instead they are a digital artist in dim lighting (for better color accuracy) then bright white pages will be blinding, "my eyes are bleeding". Ditto the late-night hacker.
Since I'm online day and night I make judicious use of the negative plugin in compiz (Super+N) and turn down screen brightness at night. When on Windows I use f.lux.
For the browser specifically, the invert-lightness bookmarklet is also helpful when a lot of images are involved:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/color.html
dave1010uk · 2011-06-11
One of the best things about bookmarklets is that they work on mobiles too.
There's a great collection of bookmarklets at https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/ (Fron the same guy who tracks changes in Firefox's nightly builds: http://www.squarefree.com/burningedge/ )
You can also turn bookmarklets into GreaseMonkey scripts so they can be ran automatically on certain sites (in Firefox): http://www.squarefree.com/2005/05/16/bookmarklets-to-user-scripts/
jeroen · 2009-02-05
Opt out for Firefox: put the following in usercontent.css
@-moz-document url-prefix(http://news.ycombinator.com/){
.comhead a font { color: #828282 !important; }
}
(how to create a user stylesheet: http://www.squarefree.com/userstyles/user-style-sheets.html )
jcl · 2008-09-30
I find the "zap" and "zap images" bookmarklets on the following page useful to sanitize formatting and hide distractions in textual content:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
m0d0nne11 · 2025-02-02
Aficionados will appreciate Jesse Ruderman's bookmarklets at https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/ which have been saving my sanity since the early 2000s.
slater · 2023-10-25
Always good to have some of these in your bookmarks toolbar:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
FiddlerClamp · 2023-05-07
For the past 20 years, I've been using the 'zap' and 'zap images' bookmarklets from this web site:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
They don't work on every site, but they're a good start. 'Reader mode' bookmarklets like https://github.com/lordastley/readable can often be configured for simple white on black text too.
agwa · 2022-08-06
Back in the day, cookies were delicious delicacies:
https://i.imgur.com/YeGGd4B.png
https://www.squarefree.com/2004/07/24/cookies-are-no-longer-delicious-…
pwg · 2022-03-30
Are these just bookmarklets?:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/
cratermoon · 2021-07-19
Like https://www.squarefree.com/shell/ maybe?
Or one of thses? https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Shells
jmercouris · 2021-04-30
You can use a bookmarklet that blocks out already clicked URLs. You can use the 'hide visited' bookmarklet on this page https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/pagelinks.html
maxerickson · 2020-12-18
There's lots of bookmarklets. I just tried the one from https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/pagedata.html in Firefox, worked fine.
Breadmaker · 2019-05-21
Color Bookmarklets
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/color.html
sp332 · 2018-12-05
Yup, you can change it in about:config under security.dialog_enable_delay. But here's a blog post from 2004 showing how easy it is to exploit a user if you turn it off. http://www.squarefree.com/2004/07/01/race-conditions-in-security-dialo…
bazzargh · 2016-06-13
I've found Jesse Ruderman's Lithium very useful for this:
http://www.squarefree.com/lithium/
It actually works on pretty much any filetype too (with the --chars flag)
radnor · 2015-10-26
Try one of these bookmarklets to make the page look better - I routinely use zap or zap stylesheets to get rid of all annoying page elements and stylings:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
jamesbritt · 2014-03-16
That just redirects me to the original site.
The "zap colors" bookmarklet is helpful here: https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
talklittle · 2014-03-14
On Firefox:
1. Go to about:config
2. Right-click anywhere, New -> Boolean:
signon.overrideAutocomplete
Value: true
More info: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=425145
EDIT: Based on the milestone set on that issue, this setting requires Firefox 29. Another workaround is this bookmarklet: https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/forms.html#remember_password referenced from comment https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=425145#c16
aaronem · 2013-10-02
For browsers not offering anything comparable to Safari's reader mode, and also for sites whose markup it fails to recognize, I find invaluable the Squarefree "zap" bookmarklet[1], which forces black-on-white and also removes almost any sort of annoyance that gets past Adblock Plus.
I don't know what moves jwz to stick with green on black (yes, very retro chic, but we have colors now! Use them!), but his content (writing, whatever) I find at least occasionally of some value; without this bookmarklet, the nearly instantaneous headache would entirely prevent me reading what he has to say.
[1] https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
pndmnm · 2013-08-27
Side note -- in case you're curious about the origin of the RSS logo: http://www.squarefree.com/burningedge/2004/09/26/2004-09-26-branch-bui… (5th item down).
roryokane · 2013-02-18
I don’t know pg’s reasons for making self-posts light gray, but you can fix problems like that with the bookmarklet Zap Colors: https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html
gman99 · 2012-11-28
Bookmarklet to force firefox to remember any password, even on pages that have autocomplete=off (like outlook.com)
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/forms.html#remember_password
Drag that to your bookmarks toolbar and run it once before submitting the form on the website you want to remember passwords on.
grayrest · 2012-10-11
I don't use 3D view but I've used Jesse Rudderman's topo bookmarklet[1], which is conceptually very similar, for years. It's more useful in IE so you can see what tag IE is failing to close but it's useful for getting a quick feel for unfamiliar markup when doing Greasmonkey hacks and the like.
[1] https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/webdevel.html
ExpiredLink · 2012-09-29
I use the zap colors bookmarklet:
https://www.squarefree.com/bookmarklets/zap.html