In Firefox 4, if you hide the menu bar (right-click in a blank area after Help and uncheck menu bar) and then maximize the window, the tabs occupy the window title bar area next to the Firefox button. They get pushed down if you tap the Alt key to display the menu bar. But that might not be relevant to how you like to use the browser...

I wonder whether anyone has created an add-on that (mostly) hides the tab bar except when you hover your mouse there or press a hotkey? You could search for one; there have been many tab management add-ons over the years.

Tools > Add-ons > Get Add-ons

or

Tools > Add-ons (search box on the upper right)

Many thanks for your answer. Things did work as you suggested if you first select

tabs on top. 

Guess my first preference would just be to get rid of the Tab Bar since it does not add anything that can't be obtained by using the Back & Forward buttons. Besides my location is already shown in the address window. Cheers Stern

You could try adding a style rule in the userChrome.css file in your profile folder. The rule would (hopefully) hide the tabs toolbar so you do not see it, although technically it will still exist.

How to find and edit userChrome.css: UserChrome.css - MozillaZine Knowledge Base

Suggested rule:

/* Completely hide tab bar */
#TabsToolbar {display:none !important;}

You need to restart Firefox to see the effect. Does it work??

If you never have more than one Tab open, why not de-select the pref to have it always appear?

There's a pref in Options > Tabs = Always show the tab bar that you can de-select to not see the tab bar until you open a 2nd tab.

That is a simple easy solution to what I was looking for. Thank you. Cheers Stern

You're welcome.

Please click the Helpful button next to the answer that solved your Firefox support issue, when you are logged in, so this thread gets marked as Solved to help other users who may have this same problem.