Why I Switched From Firefox to Brave After 21 YearsI have been an avid Firefox user since 2000 (back then it was called Netscape). I love Mozilla and all that it stands for. 13 years back I even moved my family from Switzerland to the UK so that I could continue working for…Mike Ratcliffe | Brave | January 07, 2022
Installing Debian Flavours on a USB Stick For Use on a MacBook Pro and PCBefore I begin let me just say that these instructions worked for me but if you break or lose anything then I am not responsible. I recently tried running a bunch of "Live" Linux distributions from USB but was shocked to…Mike Ratcliffe | Linux | October 25, 2021
Checking Out and Building Chrome Developer Tools (OSX Version)After almost 9 years at Mozilla I have suddenly found myself in a place where I have plenty of time to experiment. One thing that I have wanted to do for a while is play around with the Chrome DevTools codebase and start…Mike Ratcliffe | Chromium | February 09, 2020
Running ESLint in Atom for Mozilla DevelopmentDue to some recent changes in the way that we use eslint to check that our coding style linting Mozilla source code in Atom has been broken for a month or two. I have recently spent some time working on Atom's linter-eslint…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | October 18, 2016
Installing VPN from the Linux Command LineTo stop people snooping on what we are doing on the internet or when restrictive governments prevent people from accessing popular websites you can use a VPN to protect your privacy and allow you to access the internet without…Mike Ratcliffe | Linux | September 02, 2015
View jQuery and jQuery Live events in Firefox DevToolsA little while back we landed a feature that made it possible to interact with events from the markup panel of Firefox developer tools. A lot of people were excited about this but we soon realized that jQuery wraps event…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | August 28, 2014
View DOM Events in Firefox Developer ToolsI recently realized that support for inspection of DOM events is very poor in pretty much all developer tools. Having seen Opera Dragonflies implementation some time ago I liked the way you could very easily see the scope of an…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | July 21, 2014
Hack your Family: Adopt a child (UK version)A lot of people would like to adopt but do not know what to do or what is involved. They are often scared of the process or have heard horror stories. Being at the end of the process and having met our kids we can say that you…Mike Ratcliffe | Life | May 06, 2014
Firefox Developer Tools HighlighterWhen it comes to the Firefox Developer Tools Inspector one of our most common requests is that our highlighter should support box model highlighting. We are working on implementing this but before we get into full swing we need…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | October 17, 2013
Debugging Thunderbird Using Firefox Developer ToolsI recently discovered that it is possible to use Firefox Developer Tools with Thunderbird. Philipp Kewisch has done a fantastic job of his Google Summer of Code 2013 Project to bring Firefox Developer Tools to Thunderbird…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | October 08, 2013
The History of FirebugWhen Joe Hewitt was seven years old his father wanted to become a computer programmer so he bought an IBM PCjr. Joe would often watch his father typing in programs from PC Magazine. He started learning himself and when he got…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | September 25, 2013
Why it is Awesome to Work for Mozilla?Since my post about what it is like to work as an engineer at Mozilla lots of people have asked about why I chose to work for Mozilla. I had opportunities to work for Google or Facebook but I have always had a great respect for…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | September 15, 2013
Bugzilla Tips, Hacks and EtiquetteEven after a few years working for Mozilla I still occasionally come across a Bugzilla tip that I don't know about. This post is a attempt to gather Bugzilla tips from around the Internet whilst adding a few of my own to the…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | June 27, 2013
Disable JavaScript option now available in Firefox Developer ToolsAt the beginning of April Alex Limi decided that we should remove the Enable JavaScript checkbox from Firefox's preferences dialog. His reasoning was that clearing that checkbox breaks a huge amount of websites and therefore…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | May 30, 2013
The Application Cache is no longer a DouchebagIf you have ever used the application cache you will probably be familiar with how easy it is to break offline functionality and how difficult it is to work out why things are broken. With a large offline web app finding the…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | May 05, 2013
Moving your Contacts and Calendar Away from GoogleFor the past few years I have used Google Contacts to store my contacts and Google Calendar to store my calendars. These services really are excellent, particularly because they allow me to keep my data synchronized between my…Mike Ratcliffe | Google | March 26, 2013
How to install Django on JustHost (and maybe other shared hosts)If you search Google for "how to install Django on JustHost" you may be surprised to find tens of thousands of articles claiming that it can't be done and none claiming that it can. Well, it can and here's how: Log in using SSH…Mike Ratcliffe | Web Hosting | January 21, 2013
Firefox DevTools APIHopefully, most of you are familiar with Firefox Developer Tools by now, if not then now is the time to get familiar! The DevTools Team recently met up in London to talk about, and generally hack on, developer tools stuff and…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | October 05, 2012
How well does your browser protect your privacy?Having downsized my home a couple of times in the last year it is no understatement to say I have urgent space issues. I have power tools, large kitchen devices and surplus everything else. I looked online for a new shed…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | August 05, 2012
What is it like to work as an engineer at Mozilla?This question popped up on Quora recently. I have been working on the Developer Tools Team at Mozilla for over a year now and would love to let you all know what is it like. To see this from my perspective I you will need to…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | August 03, 2012
What is SOPA and why should you care?I have received a flood of emails today from people asking about what SOPA is and was surprised when I looked online and didn't see any places that explains why SOPA would be a very bad thing. The idea behind SOPA is to stop…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | January 18, 2012
How Browsers WorkPreface Introduction The Browsers We Will Talk About The Browser's Main Functionality The Browser's High Level Structure Communication Between the Components The Rendering Engine Rendering Engines The Main Flow Main Flow…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla, Browsers | October 29, 2011
New job at MozillaOkay, I have had the job now for over 3 months but I have really been neglecting my blog... after all, you all deserve to know about what we Mozillians are up to and we are doing some awesome things at the moment. I have been…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | July 26, 2011
Firefox 4, Not Just Another Version Number!So, it has been a long time coming, but I am sure that once you have experienced the awesome that the Mozilla developers have produced you will agree…. this is a download worth getting! We have come a long way since I started…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | March 23, 2011
Firebug Inspector ImprovementsAlmost a year since I last posted, I can't believe it. I am no longer spending time working on Firebug Lite, but am spending my spare time these days working on Firebug's inspector. There are three versions of the inspector's…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla | July 10, 2010
Firebug Lite - Changes Q4 2008 - Q1 2009We have made a bunch of changes to Firebug Lite over the last few months and it is about time we shared them with you. For those that don't know what Firebug Lite is, it is basically a cross browser version of Firebug. It does…Mike Ratcliffe | Mozilla, Firebug | May 05, 2009