flash

Flash and Vimium

Vimium is “a browser extension that provides keyboard-based navigation and control of the web in the spirit of the Vim editor”, MIT-licensed, for Chrome, Edge and Firefox. Version 2.4.2 shipped in March 2026; it has about 27,000 stars. Flash’s hints are Vimium’s idea applied to every app, and Flash’s default NORMAL keys follow Vimium’s where they fit.

	Vimium	Flash
License, price	MIT, free	MIT, free
Where it works	Inside web pages of the browser it is installed in	Every macOS app, including browsers, through Accessibility
Hints from	The DOM	The Accessibility tree
Modes	Vim-like keys per page, insert mode, visual mode	Persistent NORMAL, INSERT, COMMAND, HOLD and TERMINAL across apps
Search	Vomnibar over URLs, bookmarks, history and tabs	flashlight over apps, tabs, windows, tmux, emoji, plugin data, history and bookmarks by source
Configuration	Options page with map syntax	One TOML file
Permissions	Extension permissions (all URLs, tabs, history)	Accessibility; Automation per browser for tab lists

Where Vimium is stronger

• The DOM is richer than the Accessibility tree. Vimium can hint anything with a click handler, filter links by text, open in background tabs, and run on pages where the browser’s Accessibility output is thin.
• It is faster at what it does, as Vimac’s author conceded on HN years ago: an in-page script beats an out-of-process Accessibility walk.
• Visual mode, caret mode, find with regex, bookmark and history search in the vomnibar.
• No OS permissions and nothing resident.
• Chrome and Firefox on any OS.

Where Flash is stronger

• Every app, not one. The same f works in Safari, Finder, Slack, Xcode and a terminal. Vimium cannot run on chrome:// pages, the Web Store, view-source tabs or the browser’s new tab page.
• Safari without an extension. Flash reads Safari, Chrome and Firefox through AX web areas, and lists Firefox tabs without an add-on.
• The mode persists across apps. Switching from the browser to a terminal keeps NORMAL on; ]t becomes the next tmux window.
• Everything beyond the page: windows, bar, widgets, popups, plugins.

Flash features you might like

• The default NORMAL keys: f hints, gg/G, ctrl+d/ctrl+u, [t/]t, x/X close and reopen tabs, / opens Find (normal mode).
• mouse_target --scope=screen labels Picture-in-Picture players and other apps’ windows too.
• :flashlight @firefox.history rust or !fh rust search browser history by bang (flashlight).

Moving from Vimium

Vimium	Flash
f / F link hints	f in NORMAL; open in a new tab by holding ⌘ while typing the label
j / k scroll	ctrl+e / ctrl+y; j and k are unbound by default
gg / G	Same
J / K tabs	[t / ]t
x / X tabs	Same
/ find	Same, switching to INSERT in the find field
o / t vomnibar	t opens a new tab; :flashlight searches
map syntax	[mode.normal.mappings] in flash.toml

Keep Vimium for in-page power (text-filtered hints, visual mode); Flash swallows unmapped NORMAL keys, so unmap in one what you use in the other:

[mode.apps."org.mozilla.firefox".normal.mappings]
"f" = false   # let Vimium handle hints in Firefox

Checked 2026-10-14 against the Vimium README, changelog and FAQ.

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