Exporting specific bookmark folders.

hyperboraeer

Is it possible to export only specific, chosen bookmark folders, instead of all the bookmarks?
If I want to share a few specific bookmark folders with a friend.
I don't want to share other bookmarks, that have nothing to do with the topic, that I want to show him.
Would be ideal if I could go to the Webpanel Bookmark, or Bookmark Manager and rightclick the Bookmarks/Bookmark Folders, and if there would be a ''share/export'' option.

Pesala

@hyperboraeer If your friend is also using Vivaldi you can share a session file.

\User Data\Default\Sessions*.bin

hyperboraeer

@Pesala No he's not using vivaldi. I just want to share/export specific bookmarks and/or bookmark folders. I don't want to to export my whole bookmarks list.

BoneTone

Here's how I've seen it suggested to be done in Chrome in the past, it'll work for Vivaldi. Create a new profile, import/copy your bookmarks into that profile, delete what you don't want to share/export, then export to HTML and you've got the file to send your friend.

hyperboraeer

@bonetone That's alot of steps, and takes some time, but I might try it.
Could extensions probably do what I'm looking for?

BoneTone

@hyperboraeer

If your bookmarks are organized it shouldn't be difficult or take that long. Honestly, writing this up took more time than it would take to do it.

You only need to create the new profile once, every subsequent time you want to share bookmarks you can just use the same profile -- name it Export or Sharing even.

Importing bookmarks doesn't take long for my library of ~100,000 bookmarks, so I can't imagine it taking long for most people's collections. As with any valuable data I regularly backup my bookmarks, so unless I want to share some newer bookmarks I could just import my most recent backup. That export process is similarly fast.

No matter how you do it, you need to select which bookmarks you want to share since you don't want to share the entire library. Those specific, chosen folders you want to share can just be moved into a common folder if they aren't already. Then it's just select all, deselect that folder and delete the rest.

I wouldn't want to install an extension for something as simple as this, it's not worth the associated risks (trusting the extension owners, increasing the uniqueness of my fingerprint and making it easier to be tracked, etc.). Just think of the profile as the extension, it provides you some nice features without having to install some random code on your computer.

the ability to organize and edit the bookmarks prior to sharing without effecting your own bookmarks collection
easier review of bookmarks to be shared than the HTML file that is created, reducing the time & effort to verify that you didn't forget any bookmarks and also that you didn't include anything by mistake.

At most there are only a couple additional steps compared to what an extension would require. If an extension provided the same level of functionality as this, it wouldn't be any faster.

hyperboraeer

@bonetone Thanks alot mate for your effort writing this guide, and your own thought's on it. Really appreciate it!
I definitely agree with you, and will give it a try.

Zalex108

@hyperboraeer

If it's something to work periodically, look at TeamSync Bookmarks Extension.

--
"Off topic Tip"
Follow the Signature's BackUp | Reset link.
Take the opportunity to start a Backup plan, even create a Template Profile.

SyncBack | Synkron helps.

Windows 7 (x64)
Vivaldi Back up | Reset

hyperboraeer

@Zalex108 I saw TeamSync and Raindrop.io and saved them as bookmarks, just in case I would need it.
Do you backup everything in your computer into a external harddrive?

@bonetone I would like to know, what you use to backup your bookmarks, and how regularly you do it?

BoneTone

@hyperboraeer I do two things that backup my bookmarks...

Export to HTML
Archive my entire Vivaldi profile (with little to no compression and including a large recovery record)

Number 1 I do when it makes sense to save a backup, such as before starting a big organization, deduplication, import or other process that is going to make significant changes. I'll do it at the end of that process after emptying the Trash. If I haven't done something like that in a while I'll do it when I think of it because I'm constantly creating, moving and deleting bookmarks. Just looking at January I've got 17 files, which averages just a bit more frequently than every other day, but really there will be gaps of several days or even a week or so.

The archive I'll create when I think of it. It only takes a couple minutes (like 3 or 4) since I do it on my workstation not our laptop. I have 6 archives from Jan, 5 in Dec, 2 in Nov, 6 in Oct, 5 in Sept... so that gives you an idea of mean frequency. November was an outlier due to travel, so I would probably exclude it when calculating the mean, if I had a larger data set I might drop the top & bottom 2 or 3 to avoid having things like that skew the result.

If you're on Windows you can use something like WinRar or 7zip to create the archive of your profile. If you're on Linux there's a good chance you have your preferred way of creating archives. If you're on mac I can only recommend different hardware for your next purchase and looking into booting a different OS in the meantime.

hyperboraeer

If you're on Windows you can use something like WinRar or 7zip to create the archive of your profile.

A guide on that would be definitely helpful. But after all you can use any Backup program just like ''SyncBack'' that Zalex108 recommended.
Anything that backs up the ''default'' folder (into a external harddrive/whatever) and keeps it in sync, am I correct here?
Since the ''default'' folder is the only important file that includes the entire profile in it.
I guess by ''my entire Vivaldi profile'' you're talking about the default folder?

Zalex108

Raindrop is nice too.

For my needs I prefer TeamSync, and it's easier since integrates on your default browser Bookmarks.

About the BackUp,
You can join the conversation. :smiling_face_with_open_mouth_smiling_eyes:

BoneTone

@hyperboraeer

If I were going to be doing something more complex than archiving off a snapshot whenever I think of it I'd use rsync. That works on all the systems I use, and can do the more complicated tasks like differential backups and minimizing the amount of data that is sent across the network for remote syncs.

For WinRar, here's basically what I did.

Open WinRar and navigate to your profile folder. Click add to create a new archive file. Set all the settings to your desired preferences including the target filename & location, include the datetime stamp. Save the settings to a new profile and check the box to add it to the context menu.

Then to create a snapshot I just right-click on the profile folder in Explorer and choose the profile from the WinRar submenu. Type my master password and it runs (I have the file/profile protected by a password and thus WinRar protected by a master password).

BoneTone

@hyperboraeer said in Exporting specific bookmark folders.:

Anything that backs up the ''default'' folder (into a external harddrive/whatever) and keeps it in sync, am I correct here?
Since the ''default'' folder is the only important file that includes the entire profile in it.
I guess by ''my entire Vivaldi profile'' you're talking about the default folder?

Sorry, I got distracted by some really bad news and didn't address these questions.

Yeah, the default folder, unless you've created another profile or have multiple profiles. You can find your profile folder path in vivaldi://version for the user that's currently active in Vivaldi.

Something that keeps the target in sync with your live profile folder isn't a backup, rather that's a mirror. Mirroring is useful but it serves a different purpose than backups.

A mirror doesn't protect against things like user error -- if you delete something that is synced and if you later realize that you didn't want to delete it it's no longer available to be restored. But mirrors are very fresh, even updated in real time depending on the implementation. That makes it good for protecting against things like hardware failure.

Backups represent a point in time. Restoring data from them will restore it to the state it was in at that datetime. This protects against things like user error, malware, catastrophic failures, even physical destruction to the building the computer is located in if the backup is stored offsite. For ease of use to make backing up a more frequent task I keep backups on a hard drive that is perpetually active (internal or external, the storage is available immediately). That's good for protecting against user error, some (most) hardware failures, and some malware but it is also susceptible to some malware as well. To protect against all malware the backup drive needs to be disconnected from the computer; I just put mine in the drawer next to my desk and then connect it when I want to update those backups. I will create a new backup at the time the drive is connected and also copy the other backups from the live drive as well. It's best to backup often and have a bare minimum of 3 copies of any essential data. More is of course better. I've got a few methods I use for offsite backups but they get updated less frequently for the obvious reasons.

Those notes on how I backup apply to all the data I backup, not just my Vivaldi profile. Only for very large data sets do I bother with cleaning up older backups to reclaim space. The Vivaldi profile isn't large enough to warrant spending my time to deal with that with any kind of frequency. I might do that like once or twice a decade, maybe.

BoneTone

Oh, that's just my specific backups targeted to the Vivaldi profile only. In Windows it is also protected by File History and occasional full system backups.

hyperboraeer

@bonetone Thanks for clarification. Really appreciate your input in this, since you seem to be very knowledgable.
I think this topic has become very interesting for all users!
Do you backup your phones data aswell?
I do that, but not for all kinds of data. More the specific apps that I use, I enabled their cloud backup option.

BoneTone

@hyperboraeer

There was a time when a part of my job was administering and maintaining backups of my server farm which hosted the user data of ~800-1200 people at a MNC. I learned a lot in that position, not the least being that I never want to have a pager in my life ever again.

I backup any data that might be of value to me. A couple decades ago I lost an mp3 of a song that had a lot of sentimental meaning to me and it took at least 5 years to find it on a CD. I immediately bought that disc, for that one song. I think most people who are very diligent about backing up their data have at some point suffered a very painful data loss to teach them the value of a robust backup strategy.

On my phone I've got one data protection scheme going that's pretty slick. I am a photographer and so protecting against their loss is important to me. There are other reasons this scheme could be useful as well, but here's what happens.

Whenever I create a photo or video with my camera or any of the editing apps I have installed, it immediately uploads to the cloud. My computer syncs with the same cloud account, so if it is on as it usually is it will download to my computer almost immediately. So shortly after a video or photo is created on my phone there are 3 copies: on the phone, on my computer and in the cloud. If something happens to my phone, those files should still survive. Like if someone tries to take my phone and delete a photo I took, most likely I already have 2 copies of it saved elsewhere they don't know about.