All About Bookmarks…

Last month we discussed a bad habit that some people have when it comes to surfing the web. (Don’t remember? Find it here.) I also predicted that this month’s newsletter would have a section on bookmarks, so here we go!

So, what are bookmarks, and why are they good to use?

Similar to a physical bookmark (which marks a place in a book for future reference), a browser bookmark is a place holder for a web page, typically one that you reference often, saving time and the potential peril of mistyping the URL and ending up on a scam site. And the good news is, that no matter what browser you use, whether it’s one of the name brands (Chrome, Safari, Firefox), a member of the JV team (Opera, Brave, Edge), or one on the lunatic fringe (Tor, Epic, Ghostery), you have the ability to create (and edit) bookmarks.

While each program has its own nuances, it’s pretty much the same across the board. In the menu at the top of every browser, there’s a BOOKMARKS pulldown. (Except for the outlier, Microsoft Edge, because Microsoft tends to a contrarian in a lot of areas.) To add a bookmark in your browser, simply pull down on the menu as described above and look for the command to “add bookmark,” “bookmark this tab,” or something similar.

You can also edit your bookmarks – delete some, change the order, create subfolders, etc. In order to get there, pull down on BOOKMARKS and select:

Chrome: Bookmarks Manager
Safari: Edit Bookmarks
Firefox: Manage Bookmarks

(For all other browsers, it’s a similar process.)

Finally, one more organization/efficiency tip:

In all your browsers, you can designate some bookmarks to be “favorites.” Those favorites will reside on the “tab bar” at the top of the browser window. This is handy for your oft-visited bookmarks – Amazon, your bank, Facebook, my blog, etc. Of course, each browser has a slightly different name for that option:

Chrome: Bookmarks Bar
Safari: Tab Bar
Firefox: Bookmarks Toolbar

Of course, you can add, delete, change the order of these favorites as well. This is found under the VIEW menu at the top of the screen. Note that there is an option to hide this, so if your bookmarks don’t show up at the top of your page, pull down VIEW menu and confirm it’s enabled.

🔥 There are ways to sync your bookmarks, through iCloud, Google, Firefox and more.