Sunday, September 30, 2007

Have bookmarks, will travel.

So now with 3 computers at home and computers at school that I can't save bookmarks on, I needed some sort of way to have community bookmarks. Now I believe you can save your bookmarks in iGoogle. I already use iGoogle as my homepage but I wanted to try out something else. Donna recommended Del.icio.us. So I exported all of my bookmarks from my home computers and tried it out. Now I have access to my bookmarks anywhere that I have the internet. There is a button to download and attach to your web browser (a quite simple process). The button makes it quick and easy to access my links.

Del.icio.us has some other features that aren't available in most web browser bookmarks. It has a more powerful organizing tool. You can apply numerous tags to each link. You can then organize your links based on tags. You can also sort them by how often you use them. Del.icio.us even lets you subscribe to other users bookmarks. This means that when they add a new bookmark you will get access to it as well. (I haven't tried that feature yet.)

I have mixed feelings about Del.icio.us.
PROS:
- I can access and edit my links from any computer.
- Sorting options. (Love the tag idea.)
- Networking your bookmarks with other users.
- You can export your existing bookmarks to and from Del.icio.us

CONS:
- It is not quite as quick to use as the built in bookmarks tab on my web browser.
- I can't install the Del.icio.us buttons on the work machines.

Well, I will keep using it and I will make my final decision later. You can check out my Del.icio.us links on the right side of this page. Please ignore the fact that I obsess over my hobbies.

6 comments:

Donna DesRoches said...

Gary,

I like your analysis of Delicious. Actually, I really like the way you are documenting your exploration of these tools. Its great! I know that others on the committee will find it useful.

We have just made changes in the legacy Battlefords to allow access to bookmarks and the toolbar on all school machines.

Hmmm.. I will talk to the IT department about the timeline for these basic tools to be accessible by all students and staff.

Donna DesRoches said...

... to continue my thoughts. What you are writing is just what I hoped would be done to guide teachers into using the web in many different ways.

pcone said...

I too find it extremely frustrating not being able to put buttons on the toolbar to save bookmarks in del.icio.us.

Anonymous said...

Have you looked at Magnolia or Furlit as alternatives to Delicious? I used delicious for awhile but it was just too cumbersome. I have started using Claimid to host all the links to pages I want to use. I put them in categories and can scroll to them easily. I use this for all the webpages I visit regularly like my reader, gmail and others. Have you looked at Pageflakes? I use it instead of igoogle because I like the widgets better. I have started using an online desktop like desktoptwo and eyeOS which allows me to do all the work a regular desktop does but I can access it from any computer and I don't need permission to add anything to bookmarks. Just some alternatives you might think about.

Tam... said...

Hi Gary,

I'm going to try this out and I will let you know if I can get it to work for me.

Thanks,
Tammy

Anonymous said...

I travel a lot - I'm a travel writer - and there's a fantastic bookmarking site just for travel info - www.travelbookmarking.com - and it also allows you to build your own travel guide which you can open from anywhere and any machine... I find it very useful and I've only been using it a couple of weeks.