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Is it ok to enter the info that used to be in the bookmark properties description field into the keyword field?

  • 4 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 16 views
  • Last reply by dhhh

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I had login info entered in the bookmark properties description field for numerous websites. It was a very convenient place to store this info. But yesterday I was utterly shocked to see that field was gone! But I noticed there is a Keyword field under bookmark properties. So, can I enter anything I want there?

I had login info entered in the bookmark properties description field for numerous websites. It was a very convenient place to store this info. But yesterday I was utterly shocked to see that field was gone! But I noticed there is a Keyword field under bookmark properties. So, can I enter anything I want there?

All Replies (4)

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Hi, I think all of that will be gone in version 63.

You need to export your bookmarks now as the info is actually still there and can be seen if drag and drop into any open browser window. Not pretty though. So please rescue your notes and save a couple of copies :

This can be used as a separate replacement but do not know long term :

Someone has made a extension already :

Please let us know if this solved your issue or if need further assistance

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The keyword field is designed for a short character string (like yt for YouTube) that you can use to trigger a bookmark in the address bar. The effects of entering a long text could be a little unpredictable.

The Name field actually can accept over 100 characters, but depending on the information, it could be a little distracting there.

I'm going to paste my usual spiel for reference, although it might not be of immediate interest, just in case.

As you discovered, Firefox 62 no longer shows the "Description" field for bookmarks. The data is still available on your system, but can't be viewed within Firefox. It is planned to be removed in Firefox 64.

To access and archive that data now, you can:

Export Bookmarks to a locally saved Web Page (HTML File)

Please see this article: Export Firefox bookmarks to an HTML file to back up or transfer bookmarks. That creates a web page, so you can open it in a Firefox tab, or in any browser. You'll notice the descriptions nested below the linked titles of the bookmarks that have descriptions.


Next steps:

This will depend on your needs.

(A) If you just need to consult the existing descriptions: the HTML file may be good enough.

(B) If you need to occasionally update the descriptions, but don't need them within Firefox: you could consider using a reference program such as Zotero (more info below) to store your bookmarks and descriptions.

(C) If you need to access descriptions within Firefox, but it's not essential that they be properties of your bookmarks: you could investigate new extensions. These may be rough for the first few weeks/months as user concerns are addressed and you may want to consider extensions that associate notes with their own list of sites rather than necessarily tying them to bookmarked addresses.

I don't have any recommendations at the moment.

(D) If you can't live without descriptions integrated with your bookmarks: you may consider the Extended Support Release of Firefox 60, also known as ESR. The ESR track was designed for companies that only want feature changes on an infrequent basis. So Firefox 60 ESR will only get security updates for the next 10-12 months, staying stable with the features of Firefox 60. Then ESR will jump to a new version, expected to be Firefox 68. We don't know what Firefox 68 will look like; it might not have descriptions, either.

More info on this option: Switch to Firefox Extended Support Release (ESR) for personal use.


Migrating Bookmarks to Zotero

There are a number of tools you could use to manage notes and annotations on your bookmarks. This is one of them.

Zotero is an open source bibliographic/research tool for collecting references. Zotero knows how to read a Firefox HTML bookmarks file and will preserve the descriptions. You can keep your storage purely local, or you can optionally sync with the Zotero cloud.

This is a one-way trip: you can send new references to Zotero from within Firefox using a Zotero add-on, but you won't be able to read/edit bookmark descriptions from within Firefox.

If you want to try it:

The Zotero research tool is available for Mac, Windows, and Linux from https://www.zotero.org/

When you click an item in your bookmarks collection, Zotero displays the Title, URL, and "Abstract" which contains the imported Description. (Screenshot #1) Double-clicking the item will launch the page in the default browser.

Zotero also has an optional Firefox Connector webextension, which allow saving new pages to a Zotero collection (either under the bookmarks structure, or other folders the user created in Zotero). (Screenshot #2)

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(I didn't look at cloud sync.)

Using a second program is less convenient than using Firefox features or a fully self-contained Firefox extension. However, it might suit your needs.

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Pkshadow said

dhhh said
I noticed there is a Keyword field under bookmark properties. So, can I enter anything I want there?
Hi, I think all of that will be gone in version 63.

No, the keywords and the corresponding edit fields are still present in Firefox Nightly, which is the test version of Firefox 64. I am not aware of any plan to delete keywords.

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Thanks for the response. I put the info in the Keyword field and it seems to be ok. One problem though, all the text in this field converts to lowercase.

I'll look into the extension.