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Apr 09

Foxmarks Beta for Firefox 3

Posted in: Firefox 3, Firefox Extensions, Freeware, Pre-Release, Software, Today's Chili

This article was written on March 12, 2008 by CyberNet.

foxmarks beta With the release of Firefox 3 Beta 4 the other day it is good to see how many extension developers have been providing updates to prepare the launch of the Firefox 3 browser. The extensions that need the most love and care are those that deal with bookmarks, and that’s because the backend of the bookmarking system in Firefox 3 has been significantly changed.

One of the extensions that I’ve been waiting the longest for is Foxmarks (review). It’s useful because it runs in the background of Firefox, and it will synchronize your bookmarks with a remote server. That way you can access your bookmarks from any computer, or sync them with other Firefox installations. And they have a mobile interface for quick access even on your cellphone or PDA.

Foxmarks is currently testing a version of the extension that is compatible with the pre-release versions of the Firefox 3 browser, but there’s a catch. You have to sign up to be part of the Beta program (must be a registered user), and according to them there is a list of people waiting to get in. If you do sign up to be part of the Beta program be prepared to submit any bugs that you find.

And as their blog points out testers may find that there are issues while using the extension:

There hasn’t been a single report of Foxmarks crashing Firefox beta 4 yet; that version was only released yesterday, but we’ve been impressed by how the quality of Firefox keeps marching forward with each release. Beta 4 may well be stable enough for general use with Foxmarks. We’re keeping our fingers crossed.
There are also reports of occasional performance problems — sometimes sync under Firefox 3 is really fast, and sometimes it’s quite slow. Surprisingly, this variability occurs on the same computer with the same bookmarks within the same session. We’re not sure what might account for the difference yet, but we’re looking into it.

So if you feel like living on the bleeding edge there’s no better combination than downloading Firefox 3 Beta 4, and then signing up to be part of the Foxmarks Beta program.