Jan's Working with the Web

Step-by-Step: Favorites/Bookmarks Bar

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What you will learn:

to show/hide the Favorites/Bookmarks bar to add a shortcut to the Favorites/Bookmarks bar to rename a shortcut to delete a shortcut

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Start with:  Browser open

For this exercise it does not matter what page is showing in the browser.

Show or Hide Favorites/Bookmarks Bar

It is very convenient to have a quick way to open the pages that you go to often. Modern browsers let you put links to such web pages in a toolbar that runs across the top of the web page area.

Clicking one of links on the toolbar will load the site in the current window or tab. You can right click a link to get a menu that includes commands to open the page in a new window or a new tab.

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Add Shortcut to Favorites/Bookmarks Bar

The Favorites/Bookmarks Bar is supposed to hold links to the places you visit regularly - your school, your work, your web-based email, local weather radar, your social networking sites, your favorite news sites. The bar won't show many at once if web page titles are long. You can edit those or tuck them into folders on the bar to keep things tidy.

You can add a site in several ways - drag and drop the page's icon, use the Add to Favorites/Bookmarks icon, or use the right click menu.

1. Click on the Home button,, , , if necessary, to return to the Home page that you set in an earlier lesson, My Home Page with either the online address http://www.jegsworks.com/Lessons/web/start/index.html or the path to your local copy.
   

2. Drag the icon at the left of the current address over to the far left of the Favorites/Bookmarks Bar.

   Once your mouse pointer is over the bar, the pointer changes to a shape that shows where the address will drop. As the pointer moves, it may change to the No Go shape when over areas where you cannot drop.

   IE - cursor shape or square [ bracket if at the end of the bar	Chrome - vertical bar	Firefox - down arrow and line

   Warning: Drag the correct icon
   The page's tab shows the same icon that is in the Address Bar. You can drag the tab to change the order of the tabbed pages or to pull the tab out to make a separate window. But you cannot drag and drop a tab to create a Favorite or Bookmark.

3. Drop toward the far left of the bar.
   A new shortcut appears:
   if you used the online page

   If you used a local copy:
   IE: Chrome: Firefox:

   The icon for a web page can be a custom icon or a general one. The name of the shortcut is from page's Title tag in the underlying HTML code. Some titles are quite long! The page you just viewed has the same text for the Title tag and for the title that you see on the page. That is not always true!

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Rename Shortcut

1. Right click on the new shortcut on the Favorites/Bookmarks Bar.
   A context menu appears.
   
2. From the context menu select:                         
   

   IE:  Rename	Chrome:  Edit...	Firefox: Properties...

3. Type a short name of your own choice in the dialog and click OK.

   IE:	Chrome:	Firefox:

   Short names let more links show at once on the bar.

   IE	Chrome	Firefox

   
   

   You can still see the original URL in all three browsers if the shortcut goes to an online page. Just hover over the shortcut and a screen tip will show the title you typed AND the URL.

   If the shortcut is to a file on your computer, IE won't show the path but Chrome and Firefox will.

   What if there are Favorites/Bookmarks that won't fit on the bar?
   At the right end of the bar, a double chevron >> will open a list of the rest of the items you put in the Favorites Bar or Bookmarks Bar. Remember that this is NOT the full collection of saved sites. Chrome includes Other bookmarks at the far right of the bar.

4. Test your new shortcut by clicking it.
   Does the page reload or do you get an error?

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Delete Shortcut from Bar

When you don't want a link on the Favorites/Bookmarks bar anymore, it is simple to get rid of it.

1. Right click on the shortcut you just created on the Favorites/Bookmarks bar.
2. From the context menu, select Delete.
   Your new link is gone!
   

   IE	Chrome	Firefox