Ever closed a tab accidentally, only to lose the long response you have typed? Ever wrote a long reply and posted it only to encounter a server error? Ever spent a good hour sharing your life story only to have your written thoughts lost due to a browser crash?

Well, enters the "Textarea Backup" script. I cannot take credit for this script as it is written by Dan Brook. What this script does is that it retains text entered into text area fields.

The backup is transparent. You will see the effect of the script kicking in when the page is reloaded for whatever reason - be it browser crash, unintended exit, server error, etc. When you enter text into a text area, it is saved under the following conditions:

• At each keystroke.

• Every second.

• When the text area loses focus.

The stored text is then dropped when its form is submitted successfully. It doesn't even matter whether you have shut down your browser or switched off your computer, your last text will be retained. Of course, if you are typing something illegal into the form, you wouldn't want to install this script that may help retain evidence of your criminal activities. But hey, we are all clean here, aren't we?

So if you deal with online forms frequently, I would strongly suggest this script. This is a definite must for myLotters as it will save you a lot of frustration when you encounter the ever-persistent message glitch. Oh yes, not to mention the invalid characters glitch. And the discussion posting glitch. And the.. well, you can make up your own list. :P

The script is available at http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/7671 .

This article assumes that you are using Firefox as your browser. If you are not, it's time to change. You can get Firefox at http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox . To use this "Textarea Backup" script, you will need to install the Greasemonkey firefox extension first. Just go to https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/748 and click on the "Install" link.

If you think all this sounds troublesome, I assure you it is not. It's just a few mins of work at most and the benefit is tremendous.

Specially for gmail users:

Go to Tools >> Greasemonkey >> Manage User Scripts...

Then edit your textarea backup script and add this line to it.

http*://mail.google.tld/mail/*

This will prevent the script from e.g. backing up your gmail address fields and all. I am using an older version of the script myself and remarks for the new version seem to suggest that this has been fixed. Whichever, I think it doesn't hurt to play it safe. :P