Using the amazing Firefox Addon GMarks, you can import your Firefox bookmarks to Google Bookmarks, and then add a GMarks menu item to replace your Firefox bookmarks. And you get a number of extra features, one of the best being quick search. Follow the instructions outlined below and your bookmarks will be organized like never before.
- In order to import your current Firefox bookmarks to Google Bookmarks, you’ll need to install the Google Toolbar (if it isn’t already installed).
Select Bookmarks from the Google Toolbar, and then Import Firefox Bookmarks… from the drop-down menu.
- You’ll be directed to a Google Bookmarks page (if you’re signed in, otherwise you’ll need to sign in first) asking you to confirm the action. Click the Import button to continue.
- Depending on how well organized your Firefox bookmarks were (did they have tags, were they in folders etc) you will probably end out with a number of them having the “^” label.
- Select the ^ label and start editing. Yes, this is boring. But you only have to do it once. To edit each bookmark, just click the edit link next to it. Remove the ^ label and replace it with something appropriate for that site/bookmark.
- After you’re done, head over to the GMarks Firefox Addon page. Install GMarks as you would any other Firefox plugin. And as with all Firefox plugins, you’ll need to restart Firefox for it to show up.
- After you’ve restarted Firefox, select Gmarks from the FF menu, and then Options from the drop-down list.
- On the General tab, enter your Google login info in the Account Preferences section. You can also change the sorting order from the default (Alphabetical) if you’d like.
- Click the Display tab. Make any changes you see fit to the Sidebar display options. Since I rarely use the sidebar, I left this section alone.
- Now select the Menu tab in the Display section. Make sure that Enable GMarks menu is selected. If you want to completely replace your Firefox Bookmarks with GMarks (I did) - place a check in the Hide Bookmarks menu box.
Feel free to explore the Toolbar and Misc Display options as well. I left all the settings on those pages as their defaults.
- And now click the Other tab from the top menu. From here you can customize which key you want to have as your Quick Search shortcut. I changed mine from the default of
Home to the \ (backslash) key. To change the default, click inside the Quick Search shortcut box and press the key you want to use. You can also opt to have your Google Reader “starred items” show up in your Google Bookmarks/GMarks - which is a fantastic feature. When you’re done setting the options, close the window.
- If you opted to remove the Firefox Bookmarks menu item (back in Step #9) you’ll need to restart Firefox. Once it opens again, the Bookmarks menu will be gone, with GMarks in its place.
- Click GMarks from your Firefox menu. All of your Firefox and Google Bookmarks will now be displayed, sorted by label.
- You can also view the 10 most recently set Bookmarks (assuming you left this as a default)
- And one of my favorite features, your Google Reader starred items.
- My very favorite feature - double-tab the key you set as the Quick Search (back in step #10). When the Quick Search window appears start typing a label, keyword or part of the URL/domain name. The results will appear (quickly) in a drop-down menu.
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