Chapter 5
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Using Powermarks Chapter 5 |
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5.1 Searching |
Searching is an integral part of Powermarks and is always active. Additionally, the search facility in Powermarks is incremental, which means that Powermarks will update the search results as each character is typed. This makes performing searches much faster and easier because you can see the results as you type.
As mentioned in Section 4.5, there are two search types that can be used to search the currently loaded bookmark list:
A Keyword search locates bookmarks by matching the keywords typed in the
search field with words in the keyword field of the bookmarks. To perform
a keyword search, press the keyword search button and type the desired
keywords into the search field.
The Exact String search looks for matches of strings of words in any field
of the bookmark. To perform an exact string search, press the exact string
search button and type a query into the search field. Options for this
search include case sensitive searching and specifying which bookmark
fields should be searched.
Powermarks offers a range of search options along with support for Boolean search operators. See Section 10.5, Advanced Searching, for further details.
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5.2 Editing Bookmarks |
To edit any part of a bookmark, highlight it in the main window and click on the
toolbar button or select Properties from the Edit menu. This will display the Powermarks Properties dialog window:
"Notebook" tabs switch between the General, Description & Notes, User, Status and Authorization information. Left click on the desired tab to display and edit the relevant information.
When you are finished with this dialog window, press the OK button.
Keywords can can contain any letters with the exception of the following: < > / \ ! & * % + = ? . , \ | ^ ( ) { } [ ] : ; ~
A period may appear in the middle of a keyword, such as "v1.0", but may not appear at the start or end of a keyword.The Fetch command is activated by pressing the Fetch button displayed at the bottom of the Powermark Properties dialog window. When the Fetch button is pressed, Powermarks attempts to retrieve the URL and extract the page Name, Keywords and Description from the web page. The new name and description is used to replace the existing name and description and new keywords are merged with existing keywords. The Fetch command will only work if your computer is currently online.
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5.3 Changing Column Headings |
The column headings are displayed at the top of the Powermark listing in the main window:
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5.4 Status Checking |
Powermarks can check the status of a bookmarked page to determine if the page has changed since the last visit or become inaccessible. Only HTTP URLs are checked, others such as gopher and FTP are not checked.
5.4.1 Status Checking Bookmarks
There are three ways to status check pages:
5.4.2 Disabling Status Checking
To turn off status checking for a specific bookmark, right click it and select Properties from the popup menu. A dialog will appear with the bookmark properties, click on the Status tab. Uncheck the Enable status checking option. Editing a bookmark's properties is detailed in Section 5.2, Editing Bookmarks.
5.4.3 Status Checking Schedules
Status checking schedules are used to configure Powermarks to automatically status check a bookmarked site. To use Status Checking Schedules, you first need to create one. Select Status Checking Schedules from the Tools menu and press the New... button in the displayed dialog. The Schedule Properties dialog will appear; enter a name and interval for the schedule and press OK
Select a bookmark you wish to configure to use the schedule and right click on it. Select Properties from the popup menu and then select the Status tab in the Properties dialog window. Check the Enable Status Checking option if it is not already checked and select the desired Status Checking Schedule from the drop down list. When you are finished press OK to close the properties dialog window.
Powermarks displays a small icon beside each bookmark in the main window. These icons indicate the status of a bookmark and may be configured in the Status Checking tab of the Options dialog, see Section 8.1.9 for details. The default icons are shown in the table below.
Bookmark waiting to be checked
Bookmark being checked
Error checking bookmark
Bookmark has changed since last visit 5.4.5 Displaying Status Information
The status icons provide a quick visual indication of the status of bookmarked pages. To sort the list based on the status of bookmarks, right click on the column headings and check the item Status in the popup menu. This will display a column in the Powermarks window that shows a text message indicating the status of each bookmark. Sort the list based on bookmark status by left clicking on Status column heading.
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5.5 Managing Keywords |
Powermarks can add a keyword to multiple bookmarks with a single command. Highlight the bookmarks that you wish to add the keyword to and right click on any one of them. A popup menu will be displayed, select Add Common Keyword from this menu and the following dialog will be displayed:
The keyword dictionary list is displayed for convenience. Either existing or entirely new keywords may be added.
Keywords can can contain any letters with the exception of the following: < > / \ ! & * % + = ? . , \ | ^ ( ) { } [ ] : ; ~
A period may appear in the middle of a keyword, such as "v1.0", but may not appear at the start or end of a keyword.Type in the new keyword and press the OK button. The keyword will be added to each of the selected bookmarks.
The dictionary window is displayed by selecting checking the Dictionary item in the Tools menu:
Dictionary Window
Right clicking a word will display a popup menu:
As you might have noticed, the news keyword in the above pictures has a yellow tag beside it. This denotes the keyword as "tagged". Tagging a keyword is something that you manually do to mark important keywords. What is an important keyword? Anything you want. The important concept is that tagging a keyword allows you to differentiate important keywords from unimportant ones. In the above example, news is tagged because it is used as a common keyword for all news sites. Thus, by just typing "news", all the bookmarked news sites are displayed.
You can tag multiple keywords at once by selecting all the words that you wish to tag and right clicking on one of them. A popup menu, similar to the one shown above, will be displayed. Select Tag Keywords to tag the words, or Untag Keywords to remove the tagged distinction.
Tagged keywords have two distinct advantages over regular keywords:
- They are displayed with a yellow tag adjacent to them so they are easily located.
- They are displayed in a drop-down list when editing bookmarks so you can easily add them to other bookmarks. This is shown in the figure below:
The drop-down list was displayed by clicking on the Tagged Keywords button. Clicking on a word in the list will add that word to the bookmark being edited. Thus, tagged keywords allow you to define a standard set of keywords that you use for categorizing and classifying bookmarks.
In addition to the Tag and Untag options in the Dictionary popup menu, there are additional commands:
Copy - Copy the selected keyword(s) to the clipboard as text.
Rename - Rename the keyword.
Delete - Remove the keyword(s) from the dictionary.
Search - Replace the search expression with the currently selected keyword.
Add to Search - Appends the currently selected keyword to the search expression.
Show only Tagged Keywords - When checked, only tagged keywords are displayed in the Dictionary window.
Searching for Dictionary Words
In addition to operating like a normal list box, the Dictionary Window has an incremental search so that you can quickly locate a keyword by typing the first couple letters of the word. Pressing an arrow key or escape resets the search so you can type in a different word.
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5.6 Printing Bookmarks |
Powermarks can generate HTML files formatted for printing, but it requires you to use a browser to perform the actual printing. Here are the steps to print either an entire bookmark file or just a selected group:
This will display the file in your browser. Select Print from the Browser File menu to print it.
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5.7 Using Multiple Browsers |
If multiple browsers are installed on your computer (i.e., Netscape and Internet Explorer), the Preferred Browser must be specified. The Preferred Browser is used when a bookmark is double-clicked on or when the Add Bookmark function is used.
To set or change the Preferred Browser, select Options from the View menu and click on the Browser tab. Another group of tabs are displayed in the Browser Page which are used to select the browser you wish to modify. Click on a browser tab and check the the Preferred Browser field to set this browser as the default.
If you wish to open a bookmark in a browser other than the Preferred Browser, right click on a bookmark and Powermarks will display a popup menu that has the installed browsers listed at the top. Selecting one of these browsers will open the highlighted bookmark in that browser.
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5.8 Macros |
For those who are not familiar with Macros, they could also be called shortcuts. They are a means of automating a redundant process. They become useful in Powermarks because you often might search for "Computer Magazines", instead of typing those two words in every time, you can just create a macro that will automatically add those keywords to the search field at the click of button. We have tried to make them as simple and useful as possible.
The Macro View is displayed by checking the Macro View option in the View menu. Macros may be one of three types:
- URL
- Keyword Search
- Exact String Search
URL macros may be created by either right clicking on a bookmark and selecting Make Shortcut Macro, or by selecting New Macro from the Tools menu. Right clicking on a macro in the Macro View will display a context menu with the following commands:
Cut Copy the macro to the clipboard and delete it. Copy Copy the macro to the clipboard Paste Paste the macro from the clipboard into the Macro View window Delete Delete the macro Move Up Move the macro up in the list Move Down Move the macro down in the list Properties Edit the macro properties Macros can be rearranged in the Macro window by two methods:
- Right click on the macro you wish to move, and select Move Up or Move Down from the popup menu.
- Click on the Macro you wish to move, press and hold the Alt key, and then use the up and down arrows to move the macro up and down in the list.
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5.9 System Tray |
The system tray is a small part of the Windows Taskbar. Typically the system tray is in the lower right corner of the display and includes the time along with other icons. Powermarks can optionally display a small program icon
, a fast add icon
, or a add icon
in this area. See Section 8.1.5 for options regarding displaying and hiding these icons.
Left Double-clicking on the Icon
Right Clicking on the Icon
Because the bookmarks displayed in the popup menu are those currently listed in the Powermarks window, typing in a keyword or sorting the list by a different field will change the popup menu contents. Also included in the popup menu are commands to add the current browser bookmark, restore the Powermarks window and exit the program.
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5.10 Starting Powermarks Automatically |
Powermarks can be started automatically when Windows starts. Select Options from the Powermarks view menu and check the "Start Powermarks when Windows starts" option as shown below. You may optionally check "Run Minimized" to start Powermarks in a minimized state.
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5.11 Backing Up Bookmarks |
Powermarks stores bookmarks in a standard HTML formatted file with an extension of .htm. Bookmark files reside in the Powermarks directory by default, however, they may be stored elsewhere if desired.
While Powermarks can optionally create backup bookmark files, they still can be easily lost. Any of the following can cause bookmarks to be completely erased:
One of the safest and most secure methods to backup your bookmarks is to use NetSync. This service is free to all Powermarks customers, even if you are just evaluating the software.
An alternative is to backup your bookmarks to a floppy disk:
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