Ask Readers: Tips on Organizing Bookmarks?

November 6 by | 31 comments | Lifehack, Technology | Tags: , ,

Our reader, Emre, has sent in a question on bookmark organization:

I have so many bookmarks in Firefox that it’s getting out of hand and becoming difficult to manage. I have done the best I can to organize my bookmarks using folders and sub-folders, but it isn’t enough. I always have those bookmarks that could fit into multiple categories. And if that wasn’t bad enough, I have tons of bookmarks that fit no where else but in my “Miscellaneous.”

Do you have any suggestions on how to organize bookmarks in Firefox? I am looking forward to hearing from you.

How do you organize your bookmarks? Do you have any tips on making yourself efficient on its organization and usage?

  • http://blog.irulan.net M.Bischoff

    Just use del.icio.us and a small tool like Pukka (http://codesorcery.net/pukka) and you’re good to go. All your bookmarks all of the time. Private ones can be marked to be invisible to others. Tagging included.

  • http://www.zcservices.com Bryan

    I was in the same boat as you but once I found del.icio.us, I never turned back. And now with Firefox 2.0 integration with del.icio.us, it makes it easier than ever. No more clutter, and everything is tagged appropriately.

    BZ

  • David

    From Mr. Old-Fashioned So-I-Like-Folders:

    I still prefer to keep my bookmarks in Firefox. These are my folders:

    =Suspense (temporary area for interesting stuff)
    Computing
    Downloads
    Fun
    Health
    Money
    My Software (URLs pointing to software I use)
    News
    Personal Growth
    Reference
    WorkAtHome
    Web

  • bob

    The answer to the first problem is easy. If a bookmark belongs in two categories, then put it in both categories. For example I have Lifehack in a folder called “check daily” and in a folder called “productivity”

  • http://gtdrawings.blogspot.com/2006/10/thinkingrock-gtd-centric-organizer.html Joan M.Mas

    You can of course take advantage of social bookmarking sites. My favourite is del.icio.us. But I also like to have well-structured bookmarks in my own browser (you can always export your bookmark as a html file and import it into your del.icio.us account.)
    I use a Firefox extension to synchronize between different computers (Foxmarks). I recommend it.
    I have several categories of bookmarks, each preceded with the computer (for example @home_illustration, @office_GTD-and-organisation, and so on.)
    This works for me, although you can also use a portable version of the browser.

  • http://www.shokk.com/blog/ Ernie Oporto

    Keep your bookmarks online. This way you can access them from anywhere. Anything else is asking for trouble – a dead or corrupt hard drive and your bookmarks are gone.

    I use del.icio.us. But, after seeing a number of outages at del.icio.us, I decided to add Diigo to the mix which bookmarks and then also updates del.icio.us. If one is down, I have the other to access. Both are free and have Firefox extensions.

  • dan

    ‘Archive’ everything you *might* need to delicious with tags, and keep 20 or so current ones. Seriously, if you think you’ll use/need 50+ bookmarks, you won’t.

  • Casey

    I only bookmark websites that I think I will visit frequently. Any articles, recipes, etc. that I find interesting go to my del.icio.us account. When the bookmark menu gets too long, I take a look at it and move things into folders. This method, combined with google reader to stay on top of my favorite blogs (instead of bookmarking them) works pretty well for me.

  • James

    I created my own bookmarking system using xml to store the links, and vbscript to generate html 5 times a day.

    If I want to add or maintain a link I use an XML editor.

  • http://pickspalwarpigs.blogspot.com/ MonkMojo

    Delete your top 30 to 50 rss enabled bookmarks. Move to viewing feed headlines using Netvibes or Google.

    When you stop using bookmarks for 80% of your surfing, you’ll get more value out of your Firefox / delicious links.

  • Nick Burns

    Personally, I use FURL: http://www.furl.net/

  • http://www.b2blog.com Dave J.

    I gave up on organizing my bookmarks and rely on FF’s search-box at the top of the bookmarks bar. Why organize when you can search?

  • http://www.mererhetoric.com Omri

    I’ve also found that RSSing anything that can be RSSd is invaluable. And anything that’s static (articles that I find interesting), I just print and file on my harddrive (to be located later through my DSE if I need them)

    That leaves only portals and social networking sites – and there’s no way you visit 50+ of those regularly.

  • Joe Banks

    Use del.icio.us for everything non-essential, Use Google homepage for rss feeds and use Firefox bookmarks for only the essential, most frequently used.

  • Craig Allen

    I have recently switched from delicious to simpy.com, which also supports notes with tagging, as well as extensions, bookmarklets, and all other conveniences. Importing from bookmarks.html and delicious are supported, as is exporting bookmarks and notes (no lockin)

  • Bill Rafferty

    I just imported all of my bookmarks into delicious and couldn’t be happier with the results. When it was all said and done, I went through the folders and ruthlessly got rid of all but the most used ones, that I kept in a single folder.

  • http://sidebusiness.biz Pascal

    I use blinklist. Just like del.icio.us, but more controls and better firefox integration.
    Search is somewhat better but could be improved.

  • http://ajaydsouza.com/ Ajay D’Souza

    I’ve started using del.icio.us to manage all my bookmarks.

    Only a few personal ones that I don’t wish to share I have neatly organized in folders and subfolders

  • InvisibleA

    I use del.icio.us combined with four local folders, “Dailys”, “To Read”, “Private” and “Work”.

    Middle clicking on my Dailys folder allows me to open Firefox, click the folder and then go and make coffee while my daily reads load up.

  • Zappy Underpants

    Kill kill kill any bookmark not used in the last 2 months. The organizational tool really is irrelevant. Need a particular website again?

    Try Google to search for what you want to find…

  • JW

    My life became much simpler when I started scrutinizing just how often I used my bookmarks. 99% of them weren’t really used, most weren’t even visited again before they 404′d.

    If it’s a cool site I want to remember to send to friends, I let session manager keep it in a tab as a tickler.

    If it has an rss feed, I just add that to sage.

    If it’s something I can’t google (or want to help promote), it gets put on a social bookmarking site.

    That only leaves things without rss that I want to read every day and things which are deeply private. Those get put in a toolbar group and in a small bookmarks file, respectively.

  • Nima Hejazi

    Sounds strange but I use MS Outlook Notes. I copy/past URL in a note, write few words for it and finally some tags to find it easier and faste later.

  • John Lyon

    I’ve found Bookmark Base tool and it helps me to keep bookmarks organized.

    It is similar to Firefox bookmarks organizer but is much more usable and can check bookmarks for 404 errors.

  • http://www.jammo.net jammodotnet

    My absolute favorite way (I don’t like delicious), I subscribe to my daily sites with Google Reader.
    Anything I would like to get back to later, like some interesting article, I save it to Evernote (www.Evernote.com). A highly versatile and user-friendly note taking application. Free and Pro versions.
    I user free 1.5. + the Firefox extension.

    1.I have my RSS feeds that I check daily.
    2.I have my favorite web clippings saved to Evernote. I read them later, write a blog about it, or research it deeper, read more. etc.

  • andries

    A combination of the extensions Flat Bookmark Editing, Enhanced Bookmark Search and UI Tweaker results in the best bookmark setup of all. Here’s how it works:
    * Flat Bookmark Editing displays all the editing fields when you click on a bookmark, which results in hassle-free on the fly bookmark editing.
    * Enhanced Bookmark Search enables you to search the name, keyword or description fields of bookmarks.
    * UI Tweaker enables you to add a keyword or keywords before saving a bookmark, and to do several neat menu, toolbar, tab and findbar hacks.
    NOTES:
    Use the standard Firefox bookmark toolbar button with this setup, not the EBS toolbar button. Hit the bookmark button and use the EBS search field to find what you’re looking for. Select a bookmark and all the editing fields of the bookmark will pop up. If needed chop and change anything right there and then double click to connect.
    Hit the bookmark button when you’re done with the site and you will be right back where you were in your bookmark tree. It’s pure magic, super fast and keeps you firmly in control of your bookmarks.
    * With this setup there is no real need to save bookmarks in folders or somewhere on the web.
    * I use both the Keyword and Description fields to index bookmarks. One or more keywords describe the main contents of a website and the description field is used to list specific features or items. It solves that old agony: I know I saved it somewhere but where?
    * Another extension you can try with this setup is Keywordbar. It pops up a sidebar showing all your keywords plus the corresponding bookmarks. You do sometimes forget your keywords, don’t you?

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  • http://www.xerpi.com Molly

    The best thing I have found to organize favorites is Xerpi. It is very visual, and compared to a linear list (like Delicious) it is a very organic system or drag&drop menus, adaptable views that can be private or public, and access to google and other widgets. There are also two must-haves in the navigation toolbar which make collecting and organizing bookmarks while websurfing simple: a post-to xerpi (in your selected category) and a visit xerpi.
    http://www.xerpi.com

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  • Gerard

    To manage your bookmarks you can use a bookmark manager called Advanced Url Catalog.

  • Antonio Freddi

    To manage your bookmarks you can also use http://therealer.com. More, by one click you can switch your entire link views.