Used to be when you didn't like the way something was done on the Internet, you just had to sit there and take it. Find my images distracting? Too bad for you. Don't like your links opening in new browser windows? Deal with it.

All that has changed. We're well on our way to the Custom Web, where you can tweak every aspect of your browsing experience to suit your tastes, even if you're not a hacker by nature.

The gateway to the Custom Web is the Firefox browser. You may have heard a lot about this browser, and you may have written it off as some over-hyped geek fetish object.

And yes, it probably is over-hyped. But not by much. The reasons to use Firefox are numerous and varied, and I won't recount them here. (Here you go.)

By just installing Firefox, though, you're already giving yourself more control over the Web than you get with almost any other browser. The prime feature of Firefox for many users is its "tabbed" browsing, allowing you to easily switch between a number of Web pages within one browser window. (The Mozilla browser, which Firefox is based on, also features tabbed browsing, and many of the same tweaks I'm about to lead you through.)

If you're on Firefox, for example, and you come across a page with really distracting images, you can just select the menu at Tools >> Options >> Web Features, uncheck the box labeled "Load Images," refresh the page, and voila! Image-free. Re-select the "Load Images" box when you're ready to see the pretty pictures again.

Dive into the Tools >> Options menu a little bit, and you'll find dozens of ways to enhance your browser. But you'll only begin to see the real possibilities of the Custom Web when you type "about:config" into your Firefox browser window.

Testing the waters

OK, at first, all you'll see is a bunch of jargon. But it's surprisingly easy to manipulate, with a little guidance. Start by opening up this page of Firefox tips.

That page lists a hosts of ways to customize Firefox. But many of them involve creating and editing a text file called "user.js," which you probably don't even have to do, because of a little Firefox goodie that is the about:config page.

Here's how it works: I hate it when Web sites pop up a new window without a menu bar, like this. Lo and behold, the tips page tells me exactly how to make it so my menu bar always appears (look for "Always display the menu in pop-up windows"). The page says to add this code to the "user.js" file:

user_pref("dom.disable_window_open_feature.menubar", true);

But instead of bothering with the "user.js" file, I'll just type "about:config" into the address bar of my browser, and look for a line that starts with "dom.disable_window_open_feature.menubar," then make sure that value is set to "true" (double-clicking on the line will toggle it between true and false).

I now have an invincible menu bar.

Go through the tips page, see if anything else strikes your fancy, and do it the same way -- either editing the "user.js" file or editing the about:config page, whichever way suits you better. And if you want to delve even further into your browser configuration, this page lists all the settings in your about:config file and tells what they do.

If editing configuration files feels fairly advanced, that's because it is. But as you'll see, "advanced" doesn't have to mean "difficult."

Opening the floodgates

The real beauty of Firefox comes to light when we begin to discover "extensions." These are easy-to-install add-ons created by Firefox users that give you boatloads of power over what you see on the Web and how you see it.

Among the vast variety of things extensions do:

• Altering specific Web pages: This extension, for example, adds thumbnails to all your Google searches, showing you a tiny picture of the Web page next to each search result.
• Changing the behavior of Firefox: Here's one that you can configure to block Internet ads.
• Providing random information: The Abe Vigoda extension gives up-to-the-minute notice on the condition of, yes, Abe Vigoda.

To install an extension, click on its name at the Web site above, then click "Install." (If a yellow bar appears at the top of your browser window telling you that Firefox blocked the Web site from installing software, click on the button that says "Allow," and add the Web site -- in this case, http://extensionroom.mozdev.org -- to the list of permitted sites.)

The next phase of the Custom Web actually requires you to install an extension called "Greasemonkey." So do that.

Parting the Web Sea

Just like extensions, Greasemonkey "user scripts" are small programs that give you tremendous power over your Internet. But in many cases, user scripts are even more powerful than extensions.

Imagine, for a moment, that you're visiting Chicago. You want to get from the hotel where you're staying to your friend's house. So you enter the two addresses into Google Maps, and it shows you the best route to take. Only this does you no good, because you have no car, and you'd much rather take public transportation than paying for a taxi.

If only there were a way to splice the map of the Chicago public transit system onto Google Maps. Oh wait, thanks to Greasemonkey and the work of Web programmer Adrian Holovaty, there is.

All you have to do is install the Greasemonkey extension, restart Firefox, then go to this page of jargon (actually JavaScript). At the bottom of your Tools menu should be a new option -- "Install user script." Do it. Then, if you plot a route in Chicago, you can click on "CTA map" at the upper right-hand corner of your browser to figure out the easiest way to follow that route using public transit.

There's a library of user scripts like this for Greasemonkey almost as big as the extensions library.
My favorite user script is an inline mp3 player. Anytime a Web site I'm reading links to an MP3, a little button appears next to the link allowing me to play the file without bothering with the details of downloading it or opening an MP3 player. It makes reading MP3 blogs much more pleasant.

You can find user scripts that do everything from removing profanity on the Web to altering the behavior of Google. And if you're not afraid of learning a little JavaScript, you can even create user scripts of your own.

Basically, if you don't like the way something is done on the Web, you have tons of ways to change it for yourself without very much effort at all. In fact, I bet you could think of a few user scripts for FresnoBee.com. If you do, send your scripts (or your ideas) my way.