Easily make Firefox and Thunderbird use Ubuntu's notification system&#3

[Syanide]

I've actually been using this for a while now, but forgot to mention it.

Did you know you can get Firefox and Thunderbird to work with Ubuntu's default notification system via a simple add-on? Here's how it looks like:

Firefox:

Thunderbird:

Download: Firefox add-on (doesn't work with FF3.6, someone made a 'nightly' that supposed to be working with it, but that's not the case for me) ; Thunderbird add-on (this one should be getting integration with Indicator applet as well very soon. Indicator applet is that mail icon thingie :)).

Anyway, I love these, and I hope you find them useful!

I got this from here.

P.S. Thunderbird users might want to give this add-on a look as well: Evolution Mirror. It lets those of you who use Lightning or Sunbird to connect tasks with the Gnome Clock Applet! (meaning they will show in the calendar when you click on the clock) :) Needs one evolution dependency, so read the info first!

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

Doesn't Firefox already use libnotify for notifications?, There was a bug about it that was fixed in may last year.

[Syanide]

Maybe the backend, but the graphical part is only available via this add-on, afaik.

[The_Decryptor Veteran]

So the addon installs the notification app? Doesn't Ubuntu already come with one?

I assumed it was similar to how Firefox handles alerts on OS X, where it calls out to the 3rd party app, or shows it's own.

[Syanide]

I didn't explain it good, I guess. The notification system in Ubuntu is handled by a few packages, and it works for *any* app that decides to use it as the output method. So yeah, it's like on Mac OS. For instance, I get my network manager notifications, instant messengers (Pidgin, Empathy, Emesene), music player (Exaile), system messages, and so long and so forth, all through that same box.

You need to activate a plugin here and there so the app would use that notification system instead of its own (example: Exaile comes with its own on-screen-display when you switch songs etc, but you can activate a plug-in and get a more coherent look all in all).

Actually the only app I use that has notifications and doesn't use this system, is Skype, and I bet that will change once they open-source the client.

EDIT: So no, this add-on doesn't install anything, it just makes Firefox and Thunderbird use the system notification box instead of their own.

EDIT #2: I just tested the download manager, Gwget, and it uses it by default:

:)