Want to export your bookmarks to a .html file?  You can in Firefox with just a few clicks of the mouse.  This can come in handy when it comes to syncing your bookmarks with another browser, backing up or moving from PC to PC.  Mozilla has made the import and backup options in Firefox brain dead simple.

First, you will want to go to Bookmarks and then Organize Bookmarks from within the Firefox Menu toolbar.  That will open up the Bookmark Library.  From within there, click on Import and Backup and then Export HTML…

When you do, you will get a kind of “save this file as…” screen pop-up where the default name of the exported file will be bookmarks.html.  Select the location you wish to save the file to, and then hit the Save button.

There you have it.  You now have a picture perfect backup of your Firefox bookmarks.  Hope this basic tutorial comes in handy – and if you have any other bookmark exporting tips you would like to share – be sure to do so in the comments.

Once you have installed the add-on, it is simple enough to use.  Just click the Bookmark icon in the status bar:

Once you do, you get a pop-up message saying that the page has been bookmarked.  As you can see thus far, this is not rocket science.  Next, to find your bookmark, open up your bookmarks sidebar or use the drop down list feature from the menu bar.  When you do, you should see a folder named 2010.  Inside that folder is another folder named 7.  Inside that folder is another folder named 21.  Now, inside of the 21 folder you will find your bookmark.  This is representing the fact that it was bookmarked 7/21/2010.

Now either the best feature, or the biggest drawback (depending on how you look at it) is that it does not take over your current bookmarking system.  If you bookmark a page normally, it will be stored in the default way Firefox handles bookmarks.  It is only stored in this nested by date way when you click the bookmark icon in the status bar.

You can try DSBMarks out for yourself and let me know what you think.  Pick it up at the Firefox Add-ons website.

Need a good way to quickly reorganize the way content is seen on the web?  That is what Pearltrees is trying to do, and it is getting a lot of good press in delivering one of the best representations of this age old idea.  The idea of bookmarking pages is really outdated.  Shouldn’t there be a better way by now to save, discover and share the stuff you like?

Pearltrees defines itself as a social curation tool.  How does it work?  Here is what the developers have to say about it:

• Pearl the stuff you like on the Web. A pearl is like a bookmark. It holds anything you find interesting on the Web. Click it to open it, drag and drop it to move it… or put your pearl into the trash to delete it.
• Organize your pearls by moving them to pearltrees. A pearltree is a curation of web pages. It works like a folder for pearls. Unlike social bookmarking, no need to tag and re-tag. You can open it, close it, browse it, move it into an other pearltree or send it anywhere to share some of your interests.
• Discover others’ pearltrees in your areas of interest. First take a look at your connections! If you want to explore more widely you can see the pearltrees most connected to one of your own pearltrees or you can search any topic.

Also this video does a good idea at pitching the basic ideas of pearltrees in a way that we can all understand.

Overall, I am really excited to see what they do with this project and how it moves forward.  It might not be the next best thing yet, but it does have a lot of possibilities.    You can download Pearltrees for yourself to play with over at the Firefox Add-ons web site.

Would you like to have quick and easy access to everything Google with just one or two clicks of your mouse in Firefox?  That is what the Google Shortcuts add-on for Firefox promises to deliver.  The idea here is simple.  This extension will display any or all Google services as buttons next to your address bar or anywhere else you would like for it to show up.

One installed, you can quickly pull up Google Reader, Analytics, News, Notebook, Maps, Mail and anything else that is Google related.  Your shortcuts can also be displayed under a Google icon drop down box, to save on clutter too. 

Now, you might say you do not need access to every Google service out there.  You only need a few shortcuts.  You can easily customize and select which services you can see – and which will be hidden.

Overall, if you are a big Google fan – this is an add-on for Firefox you have to try out.  You can pick up the Google Shortcuts add-on for Firefox on the Firefox Add-ons web site. 

Using this bookmarklet is easy.  All you have to do is visit the web site, drag the bookmarklet to your bookmark toolbar and then click it when you see something you like.  When you do, all your buddies, friends, and family members will be notified that you think that page, article or domain is absolutely awesome.

Go grab the bookmarklet at http://likeomatic.heroku.com/ then come like me!

File this add-on under awesome.  The Places’ Tooltip add-on for Firefox adds more detailed information about the bookmarks and links you have saved to your browser. 

It shows you more than your standard name and address, as Firefox does by default.  Once installed, you can see:

the last visited date, the tags associated with the link, the description and the keywords

It shows the tooltip for and in:

all links, folders, bookmarks, RSS items in the bookmarks toolbar, bookmarks menu, history menu and sidebars

This is a great simple extension for those who just need to have a little more information handy about the links they have saved to the browser.  You can pick up the Places’ Tooltip add-on on the Firefox Add-ons web site.

The features to love here are plentiful. You can dynamically, show bookmarks by using folder and search terms.  Highlight the bookmarks in any color you would like, sort the bookmarks by name, visit time, last visited and most visited, and a lot more.

Incredible Bookmarks also help you clean house.  It can:

• Run a check to find out duplicate bookmarks in each Incredible Bookmarks toolbar.
• Run a check to check the links in each Incredible Bookmarks toolbar to see which links are no longer available.

This video covers some more of the basics when it comes to using the Incredible Bookmarks add-on for Firefox:

This add-on for Firefox has incredible promise, and I could not find a feature I didn’t like.  My favorite overall feature is the ability to color code your bookmarks and bookmark folders.  I like to keep things neat, nice and organized – so this suits my needs, perfectly.

To learn more about Incredible Bookmarks, check out the official site, and you can download it from the Firefox Add-ons web site.

How often do you still use bookmarks? 

Generally speaking, I find there are two types of browsing people.  You have those who still bookmark everything they find interesting, and then those who only bookmark what they need, and Google everything else.  A lot of the time, typing something into the search box might be a faster way to launch a web page, rather than searching through a bucket-full of saved links.

Take a stand, and leave you thoughts in the comments.  Are you pro-bookmark, anti-bookmark, or somewhere in between the two?

Once installed, the options here are simple.  You can enable or disable the multiple bookmark rows, and you can also set the max number rows to display.  If it doesn’t exactly match up with your current theme or you want to tweak it some, check out this post from the mozillazine.org forums. 

If you need more bookmark room in the browser, this add-on will do the trick.  You can pick it up on the Firefox Add-ons site.

To launch, all you have to do is hit Ctrl+Space (or for the Mac users Ctrl+Alt).  If you want to use it without the graphical launcher above, use Shift+Alt (or Shift+Ctrl for the Mac users).

Some of the best features include the ability to customize the appearance, set the launcher to open in current or new tabs, set the launcher up as your homepage and you can add as many sites to it as you need to.

You can get more information about it via the official web site, and download it via the Firefox Add-ons site.  It is nice to see a good looking and well thought out extension – and this one fits the bill.