Xmarks, formerly known as Foxmarks, is a bookmark-based search engine, a bookmark replicator, a saved password replicator and even helps out at lambing time. (Okay, I made that last bit up)…

Basically, there are two aspects to Xmarks. The first is a cross-browser bookmark and password replicator that can copy your bookmarks between different computers running Firefox, Safari (on the Mac only) and MS Internet Explorer (they’re working on Safari for Windows, and Opera – I think – but I have found that it does work in Flock).

One of the neat things it does is a “similar sites” add-on: based on how many people have bookmarked a site, it will mark with an icon the top three sites in any Google search you do (personally, I find it generally to be a reliable indicator that the site in question contains reliable information.) Also, it adds an Xmarks icon to the address bar to see site information – a rank of how many people have bookmarked it, reviews on Xmarks, and up to five similar sites.

But Xmarks’ core strength, for me, is the synchronisation. I’ve only ever lost one bookmarks folder using Xmarks, and that was through my own carelessness, rather than any problem with Xmarks. It has flawlessly replicated my bookmarks and saved passwords for nearly two years, and currently synchronises my Windows XP, 64-bit Windows 7 beta (not taken the plunge with the release candidate yet, but I will) and Linux installations on this laptop, as well as my work computer. (Like most professional developers, my bookmark list is rather large and contains lots of interesting details about the .Net framework that won’t fit in my head).

You don’t have to use their servers for your synchronisation, you can use one of your own – I did try using a directory on the ftp account for this site, but that was a much earlier version of the plugin and I couldn’t get it to work (which may have had something to do with the half bottle of red wine I had ingested as well…) Passwords, however, are encrypted with a key that you need to provide for every installation, thus making it possible for you to install (say on a works’ PC), your bookmarks without installing your saved passwords.

There are other alternatives – Google Browser Sync is now open source, for example – but I don’t think there are alternatives that are both free and as advanced as Xmarks.

Privacy options are pretty good with Xmarks as well. They don’t allow public viewing of your bookmarks (although if your browser doesn’t support Xmarks, there is a web usage / management interface available), and you can opt in our out of the bookmark contribution at any time, as well as completely deleting your account. Nothing is published to the user-contributed content automatically (a lesson Facebook seem to be learning, finally), so you can rest assured that your use of Xmarks is pretty much only what you ask it to do. (That sounds weaselly, but I’m not in any commercially associated with Xmarks, or any of their sponsors or suppliers.)

So my recommendation: 24-karat useful. (Yeah, that sucks, but people like dumb catchphrases, so I think I’ll run with it…)

Tags: addon, Firefox

This entry was posted on Monday, May 18th, 2009 at 18:28 and is filed under WWW. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.