Noticed that I have to juggle a lot more links to things these days. Usually I just hammer the bookmark shortcut and be done with it, but I sometimes lose track of all the information.
I used raindrop.io briefly in the past before I went back to just Safari reading list, but now wondering again if using a dedicated bookmark manager makes sense.
(Or maybe just clipping things into DEVONthink would work too?)
Do you use one? Which one do you use? What are your experiences with bookmark managers?
Short answer: Raindrop user here. I think it works well in terms of being able to add more context to the URLs you archive, not to mention the full-text search capabilities, snapshots of pages you save, and facilitating organisational systems (tags AND collections), etc…
More involved answer: it really depends on what you need from a bookmark manager. What do you need to do with those links once you’ve saved them? As with many of these tools, there’s always the danger of creating a rat’s nest of information you never really return to.
Raindrop works well for me alongside my other PKM tools. I store “read later” items in Reeder rather than Raindrop, for example (though I do tend to send items to Raindrop when I’ve read them).
I also like Raindrop. Main reasons:
Each folder auto-generates an RSS feed of its contents. I use the RSS feeds to automatically archive & file each bookmark as a PDF via automation in Devonthink.
It works everywhere, including in Safari which is often not supported by other browser extensions
It’s fast
It has an API which works with Integromat. I can set it to automatically add a bookmarked URL to another service. For example - add all bookedmarked URLs in the read-later folder to Instapaper. (As soon as Matter’s API works with Integromat or Zapier, I’ll switch that integration over to Matter instead of Instapaper)
I tried raindrop and it was tempting but the price made me hesitate.
But having an effective bookmark strategy is important! I use a lot of bookmarks for work. I don’t need cross-browser bookmarks as I use Safari for personal stuff and can use mostly anything for work. Google Chrome turned out to be a little bit dangerous (it has no “Deleted bookmarks” folder, and only offers immediate undo if you notice you inadvertently destroyed something useful).
Vivadi has sync and has a Deleted folder, so that is basically enough for me. Also testing Orion Browser. For really important stuff I use Pinboard and then sync that to DEVONThink via AppleScript.
I’ve been using it for years and never found paying to be something I needed.
I’ve always found that I’m the kind of person who sees interesting links on the internet and then something comes up in a conversation 3 weeks later and I completely forgot the name. I use raindrop pretty much exclusively to attempt to prevent those moments.
I’m on the free plan of Raindrop and have about 700 bookmarks in there, I’m liking it so far although there are a few things that bug me about it (subscription for nested collections and full-text archive, no offline support, etc)
Pinboard.in — great for having bookmarks on multiple machines and devices (Apple and browser bookmark syncing was always buggy for me).
There’s a rudimentary API if you want that. Its bookmarklet for adding new items is fast and works flawlessly for me. Tagging. Site is just text, so blazingly fast. You can set it so bookmarks are private by default.
Automatically creates an archive version of your bookmarked sites if you pay for the higher tier.
I apparently downloaded Raindrop but never used it. Don’t remember why. But now I’m curious again as I’m about to start a research project that it may be really helpful for.
But it did make me think about if there was a bookmarking app that you could write some notes to a bookmarked page. I don’t like storing links in a notes app because it’s not efficient.
Does something like this exist? (Not intended to hijack this thread)
Not sure if this is exactly what you meant, but coming soon to Raindrop:
It’s finally happening! Note field for bookmarks & files with markdown support (links, headings, bold, tables, etc…) will come up soon. Notes will be similar to comments in any other platform. You will be able to post multiple (up to 100) and your collaborators (with edit permission) will be able to post they own to particular item. Notes with the power of Highlights (soon) will give you an ability to discuss and annotate content in one place!
Bookmark Notes | Voters | Raindrop.io (scroll down a bit for this progress update on the original feature request)
I think so! Thanks for the heads up.
I did try DT last year as a note taking app but it was way overkill for me so I bailed on it after a couple of weeks playing with it.
I would drop this into Obsidian with an explanation of what it was and why I saved it, the same as any occasional link I may want to find in the future.
Any regular use links are saved in favourites in Safari in the Bookmark bar.
Mmm it’s possible and I’d tried it for a bit. The problem I run into with Obsidian is the search on mobile is wildly painful. To the point where I avoid putting notes in there because I know I won’t find it.
Part of that too is trying to keep slim what goes in there.
Something I appreciate bookmark managers for: prevention of duplicate links. Doesn’t happen that often, but often enough for me to be glad that a decent book manager recognises when you’re trying to add a link you’ve already captured…
You could use Hook and cobble together your own system using a note taking app or database of your choosing.
I subscribe to Raindrop.io (Full Disclaimer: I get an academic discount). As others have said, it’s nice being able to have my shortcuts synced across devices independent of any specific web browser. I also use the RSS feed from my Read Later folder in my RSS reader (News Explorer).
My unit in the institution uses Google Drive pretty heavily, so I built a framework in Raindrop to keep track of documents people share with me. As an extra benefit, it allows me to use tagging with Google Docs.
If Raindrop were LTI compliant, I would like to integrate it into our LMS.
+1 what @geoffaire said. I usually note important links into my Obsidian daily note as markdown-formatted links (pp KM) with a short note explaining why and a tag for context. Otherwise, all links in Safari.
I used Pinboard for a long time, then stopped when I found I never looked at all the crap I stored there. So I store all that in Safari and never look at it there, but at least it’s free 
One problem with saving links anywhere is link rot makes at least 10% of them go bad every year, so saving links is not a good investment of time.
I would do this but resurfacing them has proven to be a pain. Will probably write a Python script or something to extract them back out, but for now Raindrop has a good out-of-the-box solution. Also, having links that I just want to save for possible reference (e.g. a collection of stackoverflow answers useful for a current project) as well as collections that I’ll discard in a couple months in Obsidian feels like an overlap of concerns to me; most of my Obsidian stuff is more long-lasting “knowledge”.