Friday, December 6, 2019

A Question For My Web-Savvy Readers

     As you’re probably aware, I have a fair number of things “going on” at any one time. Also, I’m old, and as many old persons do, I suffer the occasional lapse of memory. But I take my work here at Liberty’s Torch quite seriously; indeed, ever more so as other once-reliable voices of the DextroSphere falter and fall silent. On top of the time I spend writing pieces for this joint, I spend a couple of hours each day scanning various news and opinion sources for stories and columns about which to write on a later occasion. And while I do bookmark the links I find comment-worthy, I sometimes forget what specifically came to mind because of them that I wanted to emphasize at the time.

     I’m hoping one of you who’s more knowledgeable than I in the ways of the Web can point me toward a browser “plugin” that allows the user to add notes to his bookmarked links. It could be as stark as Microsoft’s old Notepad program – no formatting, just the ability to accept text and associate it with a particular bookmark – as long as it provides for convenient later retrieval of both the link and the text.

     Does any Gentle Reader know of such a program? Yes, yes: I could simply keep Notepad open continuously, but there are drawbacks to that approach, including mixing up the references, accidentally closing the application, and forgetting where I saved the file, that I’d prefer to avoid. Something that houses the solution entirely within the browser would avoid those hazards.

     Please post your thoughts in the comments.

7 comments:

Michael Stone said...

I love OneNote, from Microsoft. It's not a browser plugin but you can read/write to multiple files from any computer.
If you copy and paste a piece of an article into it, it automatically records the URL that the snippet came from...

Cordolf said...

I can't say I've used them, but I see Diigo and Pundit Annotator look like they would do what you're looking for.

It looks like the term of art for this is a "web annotator" or "bookmark annotator".

Drake's Place said...

Firefox bookmarking allows you to add descriptive tags; not sure if that's enough of what you want, though.

Rick C said...

If you're using Windows 10 and not averse to using Edge, it has a note-taking feature built in that lets you draw on a page and add post-it notes. I think it's actually sort of a light version of OneNote.

Col. B. Bunny said...

I just use a Word document. Past the link and it formats as a link. Annotate.

Add table of content entries with the heading styles, if desired.

Add TOC at beginning of doc.

Zotero is an option but too complicated and not worth the effort. YMMV.

JC said...

I just use nested bookmark folders.

SecessionIsTheAnswer said...

As a liberty minded blogger, I would suggest you take some time to evaluate and become acquainted with the Vivaldi browser.

Https://Vivaldi.com

It is without a doubt the best browser available today. Developed by code slingers who value privacy and security ( sadly but not surprisingly, the majority of Vivaldi developers are not US based, freedom and liberty no longer being a thing in FUSA. Googlites being the most despotic!). But I digress.

However my reason for suggesting you take a look at vivaldi is because of your 'notes' request. Vivaldi has a built in notes and screenshot taking features. I find both features nice to use, especially when I am browsing the web and find links, pages, pics, etc., that I want to save temporarily and/or not necessarily bookmark immediately.

In any case the notes and screenshot features allow me to easily save, copy/paste, follow-up later as I need too. The notes feature has a built-in 'to-do' folder which I have started using more than the functions within outlook, since I usually have Vivaldi open. Obviously outlook and onenote are more robust apps feature wise, but should you decide to give it a try, I think you will find that it fits your needs simply and easily. At least it did for me.

The bonus is we will have one more person supporting liberty and privacy minded developer products, proving that the FANG group of despots are not guaranteed control of our data nor our world. Take a small step towards liberty!