APP SHOT

Separate the link from the clutter

WANDA SLOAN

There are really only two major problems with the system Internet Explorer uses to keep track of your favourite web sites: They are an unsightly mess and couldn't have been designed any better if the purpose was to confuse you and hide the data.

Some of the methods used by add-on software to organise your favourite Internet links is just as bad, piling complexity upon bafflement.

Microsoft allows you to put your favourite links in alphabetical order. You can also create folders, but of course then you have to remember whether you put the Post Database link under "P" or under "media" or under "technology".

Find Favorites is a standalone program that is the best I know at cutting through the clutter to give you the favourite Internet link you really need.

Start the program, start typing the name of the link you want, and you'll probably have it after you type three or six letters.

In just over a zillionth of a second, the program searches all the text in all the links you have saved against the text you are typing, to filter out the one you want. The search includes your description of the link as well as the actual URL, so if you have saved a link to Post Database and called it "Appshot" you'll get by typing, say, s-h-o-t.

Find Favorites could be better. It could be built in, for one thing, installing directly into Internet Explorer. The program works with IE as well as all the superior browsers that use the Internet Explorer engine - Maxthon, Avant Browser, AM Browser and so on - but does not work directly for Firefox or Opera.

As an added feature, however, Find Favorites will export all Favorites as a complete HTML file, essentially a web page. You can put this on your own disk and use it as a quick-loading home page, or simply as a supplementary web page loaded in one of your browser's tabs.

Find Favorites is a quick download, with good background explanation, from the Portuguese web site http://www.carthagosoft.net.

Email: wandas@post.com

Bangkok Post
Wednesday January 31, 2007