Translate/Rotate/Scale helpers I'm coming from (a long time ago) 3dsMax. It had this really handy ability to provide transform helpers and you could select parts of them. For example the translate helper was an XYZ "cross" with colors, and you could click and drag the XY plane for example to constrain movement there.

I've noticed that blender doesn't have these, so moving edges about when preparing to extrude can be quite difficult, is there a better way?
you have many options for transformation manupilatoion :

Keyboard :


press  G or S or R for translation, scale and rotation 
chose the axis constraint X or Y or Z to limit the transformation on that axis
to limit the transformation to a plane you simply exclude the remaining axis, ex: to move on the XY plane press G than Shift+Z


Mouse :


select the appropriate manipulator in the 3D view 
click and drag along any axis





while holding the object you can trigger the axis constraint by midle mouse click and rotating to that axis :