Script Updated! Now At v1.1, See Bottom Of Post For Details, But If It’s Your First Time Here, Keep Reading…
Thanks to my mate Rob Warwood, who gave me the idea of trying this, and thanks to my splendid coding skills, if you’re using Firefox (which, y’know, you kinda should be) you can return Facebook to its old, simple, sensible, newest-first method of sorting its news feed with this simple thing what I done wrote just now.
It works by changing the link on Facebook’s logo at the top left to point to a special URL which forces the time-based listing.
It’s Pretty Simple
- Install the Greasemonkey add-on for Firefox by clicking that link*
- Restart Firefox
- Click this link to load my script into Greasemonkey
- Go and load Facebook, and note the presence of annoying Top Stories
- Click the Facebook logo at the top left and note how the stupid Top Stories aren’t there, and your news feed is all lovely and newest-first again
You’re Welcome
Problems? Not working? Leave me a comment.
But please, do ensure you follow the above. My script only changes the link on the logo, so you still need to click that, but it’s better than nothing, and clicking the logo was my default method of refreshing the page already so it seemed an obvious mechanism to attach to.
*What’s This “Greasemonkey” Thing? Sounds A Bit Lewd…
Sadly it’s not even mildly lewd. It’s an add-on for Firefox which allows simple scripts to run which can modify the behaviour of webpages, inside the browser. You need to be a coder to create these scripts, but it’s much less effort than writing a full blown add-on, so it makes things a lot simpler.
You could create scripts to replace any images on a page, or filter out swear words, or strip out great swathes of page content (it would be easy to create one to hide Facebook’s Ticker, for example), or change a link or two. It’s pretty fly (but not lewd ._.)!
4/10/2011 – Update Ahoy: v1.0
There’s an updated script now, which also turns the “Home” link at the top right into a special newest-first link too. To upgrade your script, simply click the link from Step 3 above, install the new script, and refresh your Facebook page.
5/10/2011 – Version Update: v1.1
Now works properly with SSL on, or with SSL off! Automatically detects and changes the URL appropriately. As before, just click the link in Step 3 to reload the script.