Mozilla has unveiled a new browser plugin called Ubiquity that adds a single field to the Firefox browser that accepts simple commands.
Mozilla's Aza Raskin said that Ubiquity is in a pre-beta-testing phase.
"Ubiquity is very experimental and prototypical," said Raskin, who is Mozilla's head of user experience. "The interface isn't quite right and there's lots of room for improvement, but I think this is a big win already."
Mozilla's goal with Ubiquity is to streamline the online experience by letting users combine the functions of different web pages.
For example, someone writing an email to a friend about a dinner date may want to add a map. The user can activate Ubiquity with a keyboard shortcut and type in a command like "map this restaurant." Ubiquity will then show a Google map, which the user can instantly insert into the email.
Ubiquity also aims to give users the ability to see and organize information in a user-friendly way. For example, is a user is surfing Craigslist for jobs, they can highlight several of the jobs and use Ubiquity to display a map that shows where all those jobs are located.
Ubiquity also lets users translate text in-browser and instantly send emails or update their Twitter blog with a few clicks.
Although the current version of Ubiquity only works with a select few web services, like everything Mozilla does, it's open-source. Anyone can write Ubiquity commands and offer them to anyone else. Users can add Ubiquity commands to their arsenal by subscribing to them like an RSS feed.
To download Ubiquity, visit Mozilla.com.
