Reading Multiple GMail accounts using the same computer user

I've had a bit of a hack in place for reading my two gmail accounts. I would open two copies of firefox (or mozilla), but using two different logins. The second would do an su and run the other firefox copy. E.g., I'd run firefox as user tiger, and then run firefox as user tiger1. I could then read my bopolissimus@gmail.com account as tiger, and the other firefox running as tiger1 would read bopolissimus.lists@gmail.com.

It worked out that way (couldn't read bopolissimus.lists@gmail.com as tiger) since when I'd surf to www.gmail.com, the browser would notice that it already had a cookie for there and would identify itself with that cookie.

I just noticed that it *is* possible to open two different gmail accounts as the same (linux logged in) user. Firefox has a -P parameter (for profile). The solution is:

1. start firefox with the -P parameter. This allows you to create,edit,delete profiles.
2. create two profiles (or one profile for the other account, use the default profile
for the first account).
3. when starting firefox, specify which profile to use with -P

This isn't as big a deal as it might seem, since the normal thing to do would
be to create a launcher (shortcut) on the desktop. For the main account,
set the program to run as "firefox -P default", and for the other account,
set it to "firefox -P [whatever_the_other_profile_is]".

Netscape has always had that feature, as does mozilla, I think. I just never
used profiles before. Now it comes in handy though.