Sync Firefox Bookmarks with Windows Favorites

[rshol]

There is an addon called Syncmarks that can automatically sync Firefox bookmarks with windows favorites, to make it easy to use favorites from the start menu, especially in Vista and Win 7. However this addon only works with FF2. Does anyone know of a similar addon for FF 3.5+? I've been poring through available addons and googling with no results. Thanks.

[the-edmeister]

Xmarks.



.

[rshol]

Thank you very much for your post pointing me to xmarks. I had seen xmarks and considered it, but was turned off because it syncs to an xmarks account on an xmarks server. So to get bookmarks from firefox to ie on the same computer I have to round trip through the web. Not only that, but it appears that xmarks is some sort of social site that gives recommendations for sites based on what other people are bookmarking, surely something to be avoided.

I just want something that, silently, without additional intervention, without resort to the web, changes Windows/IE favorites when I change Firefox bookmarks. like Syncmarks did.

[rshol]

Installed xmarks bring your own server version and it syncs well with my ftp server, but xmarks ie is not compatible with with byos and there are numerous complaints about how xmarks (using the xmarks server) is not doing a good job syncing between ff and ie. In addition, ie xmarks is not really an ie plugin, it runs in the tray all the time in the background.

xmarks byos appears to be a fine way to sync between firefox on different machines, but...

[rshol]

Seriously, I would have thought updating favorites would have been something built into the windows version of Firefox.

I found another older program called Bookmark Bridge that could sync ff and ie bookmarks, but it was written back in the day when ff saved bookmarks as html, before the advent of .json files and the inexplicable piece of performance devouring you-know-what that is places. But I digress.

Obviously I've wandered off into the middle of nowhere by myself yet again, all I hear is chirping crickets. Must be the alzheimers.

[dfoulkes]

Seriously, I would have thought updating favorites would have been something built into the windows version of Firefox.

That does not make sense... why would Mozilla build into Firefox the code to keep IE favorites updated?

[rshol]

why would Mozilla build into Firefox the code to keep IE favorites updated?

Because it lets you access your ff bookmarks from the start menu and from other places in the OS where they can be accessed. Its not so much updating ie favorites as updating Windows Favorites, which are one and the same. The default Windows browser should update favorites. Can't be that hard you just write html to \users\user\Favorites. Windows FF probably ought to do that. Its part of OS integration like making html files open with ff automatically, using native widgets, etc. FF ought to be working on jump lists for Windows 7 too.

[wygjae]

why would Mozilla build into Firefox the code to keep IE favorites updated?

" Because it lets you access your ff bookmarks from the start menu and from other places in the OS where they can be accessed. Its not so much updating ie favorites as updating Windows Favorites, which are one and the same. The default Windows browser should update favorites. Can't be that hard you just write html to \users\user\Favorites. Windows FF probably ought to do that. Its part of OS integration like making html files open with ff automatically, using native widgets, etc. FF ought to be working on jump lists for Windows 7 too."

Spot-on the above!

The moment I tried FF this has been annoying me terrible, to the extend that I went back to IE.

OF COURSE, links to web sites (favorites of bookmarks) must be immediately activatable from anywhere in an operating system, i.e outside FF. I am stunned that Windows FF3 developers have not realised that from day one. Surely, a Windows IE shortcut equivalent that activates a FF bookmark and opens the web page in FF is a minimum requirement for FF on Windows.

Mozila FF developers, please reconsider if ever you want to win the browser battle.

[DanRaisch]

It's very simple in Firefox to save URLs to shortcuts on the desktop or in a folder dedicated to the purpose. Since the browser is going to be launched anyway in order to view and use the website the URL leads to, it really doesn't seem that big an issue to launch the browser first and then access the site. It's just a different order of actions.

[wygjae]

Am I missing a point here? Is there indeed a way I can go from Windows desktop to external site with a single click? Could you be so kind to say how?

Of course 1 click vs 2 clicks is important; It is 100% more efficient! I know it sounds academic, but ultimately when you do intensive screen interactions day after day professionally, then these small considerations do add up, and decide the choice. MS understands that very well.

[DanRaisch]

If you click on the icon at the left of the location bar and drag and drop that to the desktop it will create a short cut. If you want to save that short cut in a folder other than the desktop, just have that folder open and drag and drop the icon to that.

[roparr2]

Because it lets you access your ff bookmarks from the start menu and from other places in the OS where they can be accessed. Its not so much updating IE favorites as updating Windows Favorites, which are one and the same. The default Windows browser should update favorites.

If FF were your default browser, and I realize it no longer is, what does it matter if IE Favorites are always updated? On the few occasions I need to view page in IE, I right click "View this page in IE." Sometimes i have to copy a URL and paste into IE, but those 2 occasions are rare.

If I were crazy enough to use them roughly equally, I could just import back and forth in the Menu Bar.

No reason you can't put a shortcut to bookmarks in your Start Menu or anywhere else. It will open in your default browser.

[wygjae]

Thank you roparr2,

Your: "No reason you can't put a shortcut to bookmarks in your Start Menu or anywhere else [...]"

Can I indeed do that? "... put a [Windows] shortcut [SINGLE] to [FF3] bookmarkS (PLURAL) in Start or anywhere else".

Could you please be so kind to tell me how to do that?

Thanks in advance

[roparr2]

Bookmarks file to Start Menu:
Right-click on the bookmark folder in Windows Explorer, drag it to the StartMenu, into Programs, let go at the right place, and click "Create shortcut here." That's a shortcut to the entire bookmark file.

To drag it to a folder, open W Explorer, viewing the destination on the left and bookmarks on the right, right-click bookmarks and drag to the correct folder, drop, click "create shortcut here."

To place a single bookmark, open the correct folder in one window, open FF in the window on top, make the FF window a bit smaller, and right-click-drag a bookmark out of you bookmark folders into the correct folder. You can also drag the URL icon from the URL bar.

For example: I was installing a new CPU fan and I found how-to videos on it at Youtube. For future reference I wanted to keep the links to the videos. I opened My Documents>Tech help> Hardware>CPU and Mobo, opened FF on top, and dragged the URL to the folder. I changed the name from Youtube's cryptic ones to "CPU fan installation." As long as the Youtube page exists, the bookmark is valid. A shortcut may have ANY NAME you wish within naming rules.

You can't drag single URL's from the bookmark file in Windows Explorer, because they all comprise one file, unlike in IE.

[roparr2]

Let me know if that works for you.