When I first wrote my Firefox extension titled “Bookmark Current Tab Set”, I decided to release once it successfully did only what I wanted it to do. However, I later wanted this extension to do more, and other users may have also wanted it to do more. Releasing an extension that did little other than what Firefox already did may have led to a lack of interest in it. Perhaps I was putting in more effort than necessary to prevent this extension from being considered bloated. However, I considered this extension excessively basic and minimalistic, and I thought that it needed more features so that it would be considered more useful. I have previously mentioned which features may be added to it in the future, as I knew that I needed to make it less basic. And now, a new version of the extension has been released, and it now has features that I, and some other users, wanted it to have.
I have mentioned previously that sometimes when I bookmark a set of tabs, I like to have the time and date when these tabs were bookmarked to be included in the name of the folder that will contain these bookmarks. However, there are times when I would like additional information to be included in the bookmark folder’s name. I sometimes like to be absolutely sure why I bookmarked certain sets of tabs that I had open at certain times. And information on when these bookmarks were added is not always enough information to remind me why I bookmarked the tabs that I had open at a particular time. I would sometimes like information on what each of these bookmarked pages has in common (aside from the date and time when they were bookmarked) in the bookmark folder name. And if that additional information is included, then there may not be as much need to include the time of the day when the set of tabs was bookmarked in the folder name. In addition, there is some information that version 0.1.0 of the extension includes in bookmark folder names that is unnecessary. I was reminded of this fact when a user mentioned that the time zone does not need to be included in the folder name. Also, the format of the date may be something that users would want to adjust. This new version of the extension was written with ideas such as these in mind.
In this new version, one can still immediately bookmark all tabs by selecting the menu option to quickly bookmark the current tab set. However, there is now an option to bookmark all tabs that brings up a dialog similar to the one that appears when choosing Firefox’s option to bookmark all tabs. The difference is that initially, information on when this bookmarking is done already appears in the text box where the bookmark folder’s name is to be entered. Users can then modify what is initially entered as the folder name. The screen shot on the left below displays the menu options for bookmarking the current tab set, and for quickly bookmarking the current tab set. The one on the right displays the dialog that appears when choosing what is the new regular option for bookmarking the tab set.
The other most significant change to the extension is the addition of options for adjusting what the bookmark folder name will be. By default, the bookmark folder name will contain the date in the same format that it previously had. The bookmark folder name will also contain the time of the day that the bookmarking was done by default. However, there may be those who would like the format of the date to be different. As one can see in the screen shot below, there are three other formats from which to choose when selecting the format of the date. As can also be seen in that screen shot, inclusion of the time of the day when the bookmarking was done is now optional.
As always, I would appreciate receiving feedback regarding changes that can be made to this extension. It was feedback from users that helped make this extension what it is now. And feedback from users will be needed to make this extension as good as it can be.