Managing Bookmarks
Last Update: December 15, 1998
Since the Web is such a vast empire of information, it is easy to get
lost. The guide on "How
to search the web" provides good advice how to stay focused and how
to find what you are looking for. Note that this guide was written in 1996,
and some details may have changed, but it is still useful as a general
introduction.
Now, suppose you have found an interesting site. Many site are huge,
so you don't want to save everything, you may not even have the time to
explore everything, you may be unsure whether the information is really
useful, etc. The worst mistake that you can make is to forget to record
the address of the site ("URL") so that you can easily get back, check
again, save/print something that you now need, etc.
In theory, you could just write down the URL on a piece of paper, save
this piece of paper, and then type in the URL the next time you want to
visit. However, URL are often quite long and they are case-sensitive
(meaning it makes a difference whether you use lower or upper case). If
you get a tiny detail wrong, the URL won't work and you will be unable
to revisit. So, you want to keep a bookmark file.
Generating and updating a book mark file
If you have your own computer at home, that's not much of a problem.
Netscape automatically generates and updates your bookmark file. All you
have to do is to open the "Bookmarks" pull-down menu and click on "Add
Bookmark" or "File Bookmark". The difference between the two commands is
that "File Bookmarks" lets you choose on the spot into which "folder" (see
below) you want to save the bookmark whereas "Add
Bookmark" saves the bookmark into a pre-selected folder and thus is a bit
quicker.
If you use computers at Hunter (or anywhere else where you don't
have complete control over the work station), a few additional steps are
necessary. Unfortunately, the details depend on what lab, what operating
system, and what version of Netscape you are using. The descriptions below
refer mostly to the Social Science lab (HW606/7) where our class meets,
but apply for the most part also to the labs on the 10th floor
of HN (also known as the "ICS labs"). These labs still give you a choice
between running (booting) your station in
Make sure that you use "Win95" and get used to it (if you are not already)
since many software products (including WordPerfect, SPSS, and MS Word)
are no longer upgraded in Win3.x versions. To be able to use the recent
versions you must use Win95. Other software (including Netscape) still
produces new versions that run under Win3.x - but they are typically released
at a later time or they do not have the full set of features that the Win95
version has. For this reason, I will only use Win95 for this class. If
you are stuck with a Win3.x environment somewhere, go to the course page
from the fall 97 semester (Soc 325-22Y) to view an older
version of this document which includes instructions for Win3.x as
well.
Win95 environment
As of December 1998, the ICS lab still run an obsolete version (3.0) of
Netscape. Hopefully, by February 1999, they will have upgraded the software
to the recent version (4.5) that you find in the Social Science lab. The
instructions are based on the recent Netscape version, some adjustments
may be needed when working with obsolete versions of the Netscape browser.
You may want to print this page, so that you have the instructions right
in front of you when you try it the first few times. It may sound very
complicated, but it really is not!
Once Netscape is loaded, click on "Bookmarks", "Edit Bookmarks", "File",
"Open Bookmark File", and fill in the details about the location of your
bookmark file: There is a box labeled "Look in" which should read
"Floppy (A:)", and a box labeled "File name" that should read "bookmark.htm".
This can be done in different ways: One possibility is to type "a:" in
the "File name" (!) box and to press ENTER, this will bring up the desired
entry in the "Look in" box. The other possibility is to click on the folder
change button next to the "Look in" box and use the associated display
of subfolder to get where you want to go (the a: drive). This second way
may not work on all stations in the HN1001 labs. But depending on whether
you are a "mouse" or "type" person, you may like the first way better anyway.
-- In any case, once "Look in" box shows "Floppy (A:)", the contents of
your diskette is displayed in the large box. And, provided you put the
right diskette in the disk drive, one of the files should be your bookmark
file (named "bookmark.htm"). Just click on this entry, and the "File name"
box will fill with the desired entry. To complete, you click on the "open"
button. Your bookmark file will show on the screen. Minimize it by clicking
on the "_" button in the upper right corner. All changes you make to your
bookmark file will be recorded on your diskette. At the end, simply make
sure to close the bookmark file and to remove your diskette from the drive!
Warning:
In contrast to Win3.1, the Win95 environment has a larger component that
is stored locally on each station. Therefore, there is always a chance
that a previous user has made changes that are still in effect -- even
if you cold-boot the station. For example, while testing in the HN1001
labs (some time ago) I came across a station where some user had added
an icon for Netscape on the desktop. This icon, however, started a wrong
version of Netscape (for the technically inclined, the 16-bit version rather
than the 32-bit version). So, when in the HN1001 labs, always go via the
ACS menu to access any program. Note, ACS used to stand for "Academic
Computing Services", now these labs are called the ICS (= Instructional
Computing Services) lab, but occasionally you may find traces of the old
name. Not to worry, same difference ...
Keeping a bookmark file neat
If your bookmark file is small, it is fine to keep all bookmarks in just
one list. However, as your list of bookmarks grows -- and that happens
faster than you think -- it's a good idea to subdivide your bookmark file
into folders. Each folder then contains links to sites that are
thematically related. Within each folder you can have subfolder, and then
subfolders of subfolders. But, let's not go overboard. One level of folders
is probably enough for starters. The details for doing vary slightly between
different Netscape versions, so I won't go into this. Anyway, this is something
that you must try out for yourself, a lengthy description won't do much
good. But you start with "Editing Bookmarks" and the "File" menu (as discussed
above).