Firefox Live Bookmarks

Software name: Firefox
Software version used for this installation: 2.0.0.3

Websites are updated regularly. If you want to keep track of updates from a particular site you ask Firefox to inform you when new content is published. This process is called 'Live Bookmarking' in the Firefox world.

Not all sites can be tracked in this manner. A website has to enable this functionality by using what is also known as 'RSS' (also commonly called a 'feed'). Typically feeds are used on news sites so you can keep track of headlines, however it can be used by any website and RSS is also the technology behind Podcasts.

When you keep track of a website via RSS, this is usually known as 'subscribing' to the content or 'subscribing to a feed'. However Firefox calls this 'Live Bookmarking'.

The advantage of subscribing to content in this manner is that you don't have to keep visiting the website to see whats new. Firefox will track the site for you and inform you of changes. If you use Live Bookmarking to subscribe to a Podcast then Firefox sends the subscription information to whichever software you have that manages your Podcasts.

Which sites can be 'Live Bookmarked'

Before you try to subscribe to a website you first need to know if that site supports subscriptions. Fortunately Firefox makes this easy by displaying an icon in the location bar of the browser.

 

Up close you can see the icon looks like this:

 

If you see this icon then you can subscribe to the feed (make a live book mark).

How to make a Live Bookmark

To make the live bookmark you must now click on the icon:

A drop down menu will then appear, this is a list of all the 'feeds' you may subscribe to:

 

You can then scroll down the list to choose your bookmark:

When you have selected the feed you wish to subscribe to, then release the mouse and Firefox will bring up the information about the feed in the browser window:

This page displays the channel name of the feed (in this case it is 'Mozilla Developer News') and a list of headlines and news items. If you like the look of this feed you can now make a decision to subscribe using a 'live bookmark' or using another application to handle the feed. We are going to keep with making a live bookmark so we just make sure the drop down box displayed says "Live Bookmarks":

Press the "Subscribe Now" button:

 

You will now see a pop up that asks you where you want to store the information:

Here we can choose where we want to have the bookmark stored. if you choose the default ('Bookmarks Toolbar Folder') then your live bookmarks will actually display in your browser in the bar below your address bar. So, lets just stick with the default and press 'Add'. When you have done this then you will see the bookmark appear in the 'bookmark toolbar' like so:

You can see in the above image the live bookmark icon for the feed I just subscribed to has appeared on the right.

Accessing the live bookmark

To use the bookmark you just need to click on the icon in the bookmark toolbar, and scroll down to the item you want to read:

When you do this Firefox will open the news item for your reading pleasure. Remember that you can check the live bookmark regularly and see if there are any new items (thats the whole point!).