Power up to better bookmarks

This month Miraz Jordan shares some useful techniques for bookmarking web pages. [First published December 2006.]

It’s del.icio.us

What a nuisance! You bookmarked that web page of useful Mac tips, but that was on your home computer and now you’re at work, or visiting a friend, or using a different web browser. You’ll have to search all over again. Unless you make use of a free service called Del.icio.us, that keeps your bookmarks online: http://del.icio.us.

Sign up

Visit the Del.icio.us website and sign up for a free account. Verify the account by clicking on the URL in the email you receive. To make using the service easier, add the Post to Del.icio.us and My Del.icio.us bookmarklets to your web browser toolbar. There is a Help page with details, if you’re not sure how to do this. I signed up with the account name: mirazj.

Add bookmarks

Now surf around the web in the usual way. When you come to a page you want to bookmark click on the Post to Del.icio.us bookmarklet in your toolbar. You may need to login at this point, but once you’ve done that you’ll arrive at a screen where you can enter tags (categories) and save the bookmark. Then you’re returned to the page you were visiting. You can access your list of links from any web browser anywhere in the world. Mine are at: http://del.icio.us/mirazj.

Screenshot 1: A few of my bookmarks at Del.icio.us. Note all the tags on the right. I can also see how long ago I added a bookmark, and how many other people bookmarked that page.

Pukka

The Del.icio.us bookmarklets make it quick and easy to bookmark a page. Another tool making bookmarking easy is a piece of software called Pukka (codesorcery.net/pukka, US$5).

Download and install Pukka. Then, if Pukka hasn’t asked you for the account information for Del.icio.us, go to the Pukka menu and get the Preferences….

Click the Plus symbol to add an account, enter your Account name and password for Del.icio.us, then click the Save button. If you have more than one account at Del.icio.us, then go ahead and enter the details for any other accounts. For example, you may have one account for work and another for home.

If you like, go to the Pukka menu again and choose Install Bookmarklet. A web page opens with instructions and a link to drag to your web browser’s Bookmarks bar.

Screenshot 2: I’ve selected some text on a web page and click the Pukka bookmarklet.

Now when you want to bookmark a page at Del.icio.us either fill in the details in the Pukka window and click the Add Link button, or visit a web page and click the Pukka bookmarklet link. Pukka opens, with some information already present, allowing you the opportunity to edit the URL, Title, Tags and Description before clicking the Add Link button.

Screenshot 3: Fill in details in Pukka.

Pukka is simple, helpful and unobtrusive. It also has a free trial and costs only US$5 if you decide to keep using it.

Delibar

If you use Mac OS X 10.4. (Tiger) you may like to use Delibar (www.rknet.it/program/delibar) to make it easier to access your Del.icio.us bookmarks. Delibar is free, but if you find it useful you may like to make a donation to its author.

Download and install Delibar. Then, if it hasn’t asked you for the account information for Del.icio.us, go to the Delibar menubar item and get the Preferences…. Enter your Del.icio.us Account name and password, then click the OK button.

You may need to choose Reload Bookmarks from the Delibar menubar item, but once it’s showing your bookmarks, you’re good to go. Click on the Delibar icon in the menubar and you’ll see all your Del.icio.us bookmarks listed, by tag. To speedily reach a tag, don’t scroll, but instead just type the first letter of the tag. When you select a bookmark it opens in your default browser.

Screenshot 4: Choose a bookmark from the Delibar menu.

Another site to add to your Del.icio.us bookmarks is the MacTips archive: www.mactips.info.

This article was first published in Macguide magazine Issue #30 November / December 2006 and may have been modified from the original.

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