Google introduced this feature in Google Chrome and Mozilla will include it in Firefox 3.5. Webbrowsers with a “anonymous mode” – some people will call it “porn mode” – where no personal information is saved – are sexy…

Fans of Firefox don’t have to wait until Firefox 3.5 will be release, you can have this feature in Firefox 3.0 too. But you have to do this by hand. So, what do you have to do?

Firefox can manage more than one profile with it’s built in profile manager. Usually you don’t get in touch with it, so please close all windows of firefox and open the profile manager via the command

$ firefox -P

Inside the application you’ll find your “default” profile. So now you have to create a new profile. I called my new one “anonymous”. The name doesn’t matter, but remember the name and replace the name inside the following command.

After you created your new profile, select the new one and start firefox. You should see a window of Firefox without all your bookmarks and settings. This is your new “anonymous” profil, so adjust Firefox to your needs so that it saves only few/or now informations. At least you should set the following settings:

• Deactivate Java and JavaScript under “Edit -> Preferences -> Content”.
• Turn off or limit the storage of cookies inside “Edit -> Preferences -> Privacy”. Also check that private data like your history is cleared when you close the browser.
• Take a look at addons.mozilla.org and search for extensions who offer better privacy features. Perhaps you find something useful.

As a short node: Perhaps you should consider installing the add-on Personas inside your “AnonFox”. I stumbled upon this extension on Onli’s Blog. With Personas it’s possible to give Firefox a new look. I use it to give my AnonFox a different look, so that I can see which browser I’m using.

Now you’re done. You can close all instances of Firefox and start your “normal” Firefox. If the wrong profil is uses, please use the profile manager once to choose the standard profil. To start your anonymous Firefox as a second instance use

$ firefox -P anonymous -no-remote

Both instances of Firefox live happily side by side. When you close your AnonFox, everything will be delete but your normal Firefox won’t be touched.

Last but not least, it’s time time to integrate your new AnonFox into the menus, since it’s quite inconvenient to use a terminal every time you wan’t your AnonFox.

Please open the menueditor via a click with the right mouse button on the menu “Applications | Places | System” inside your Panel and click on “Edit menus”. This will open the menu editor of GNOME. Inside the section “Internet” you can add your new item. As command use

$ firefox -P anonymous -no-remote

and as icon you can use e.g. this darkened version of the original Firefox logo.

Please Note: Eventually you have to adjust the “default” entry for Firefox too. When you start the Firefox with anonymous profile before you started your “standard” Firefox you end up with a second window of your AnonFox. So perhaps you have to adjust the default entry too. Personally I don’t care about this, cause it happens quite seldom that I use my “AnonFox”.