Lots of people now have multiple computers, at home and at work, and many use more than one Web browser. That makes it hard to keep bookmarks straight. If, for instance, you bookmark a Web site as a 'Favorite' on your PC at work using Microsoft's Internet Explorer, it doesn't automatically show up as a bookmark in Apple's Safari browser on your Macintosh at home.

    But I've been testing a new, free program, available now, that aims to solve this problem. It synchronizes your bookmarks automatically among all your computers, Windows or Mac, and across all the main brands of Web browsers -- Internet Explorer, Safari and Mozilla's Firefox. On PCs running Windows XP or Vista, it works with Internet Explorer and Firefox. On Macs, it works with Safari and Firefox.

    The program is called Foxmarks, and it's from a San Francisco company of the same name. The Foxmarks software has been around since 2006, but worked only with the Firefox browser -- hence the name. Yet Firefox isn't the dominant choice on either Windows or Mac. So the company decided to expand the product to Internet Explorer, which is the built-in browser on Windows (and thus No. 1 in the world) and Safari, which is the built-in browser on Mac.

    This new version, available for download at foxmarks.com, doesn't merely synchronize your bookmarks between copies of the same browser. It synchronizes them between different browser brands, even if some are running on Windows PCs and some on Macs.

    In my tests, Foxmarks worked well, with a few minor caveats. After using it for five days, I now have exactly the same set of bookmarks (or Favorites, in Internet Explorer's parlance), arranged in the same order, on multiple computers -- Windows and Mac -- in a total of 12 different copies of Internet Explorer, Firefox and Safari.

    There's a different version of Foxmarks customized for each of the three main browsers, but each talks to the same password-protected Web account, which contains the latest version of your bookmarks. When you add, delete, rename or rearrange any bookmark in any browser on any of your computers, the Foxmarks software sends the change up to the Web account. Then, the next time any of your other browsers checks with the Web account, it receives the change.

    For example, in my tests, I bookmarked a Wikipedia article in Firefox on my Dell running Windows Vista. Foxmarks then caused that same new bookmark to appear in Internet Explorer on the same Dell, and in both Firefox and Safari on my Apple Macintosh computer. And, on each machine, the new bookmark for the Wikipedia article was in the same location.

    In another case, I changed the order of two bookmarks in the Bookmarks Bar in Safari on one of my Macs, and the same re-ordering was replicated on a Windows PC in the Links Toolbar of IE and in the Bookmarks Toolbar of Firefox.

    If you don't want exactly the same set of bookmarks on all your machines, you can set up different profiles with different bookmarks for your work and home computers.

    You can access the password-protected Web site containing your bookmarks from any PC, even if it isn't one of yours, and can view a customized version of this site via the browser on an iPhone or other smart phone. You can even set up a mobile profile that will show you just a subset of your bookmarks in your phone's Web browser, though you can't sync bookmarks to and from a phone.

    From the Web, you can alter your bookmarks, and these changes will then be pushed down to the browsers on your computers. You also can share bookmarks with others via email or an RSS feed.

    There are other Web-based repositories of bookmarks, notably a service called Delicious. But none that I know of automatically synchronizes bookmarks among browsers and computers, which is the main function of Foxmarks.

    Foxmarks has another feature: It can also sync stored passwords for Web sites you frequently visit. But this trick works only in Firefox, and in my tests didn't work properly all the time.

    The software has a few other limitations and glitches. The Internet Explorer version is still labeled a beta, or test, version because it still produces occasional syncing errors, especially in Vista. That was true in my tests, and I'd be wary of using it with Vista, though it performed solidly in Windows XP. It works reliably only with Internet Explorer 6 or 7, not the pre-release version of Internet Explorer 8, which the company isn't yet supporting.

    On the Mac, Foxmarks works only with the current Leopard version of the operating system and the current version 3 of Safari. It doesn't work with the Windows version of Safari.

    And syncing isn't instant. It can take as long as an hour for each computer to check with the Web site and get the changes.

    The company plans to keep Foxmarks free, but is hoping to make money from future, unspecified products.

    Foxmarks is a clever, well-done product that can help users of multiple computers and multiple browsers to keep their Web lives in order.

    如今很多人都有不止一臺的電腦：家里有一臺、辦公室有一臺；很多人還不止用一種網(wǎng)絡瀏覽器，這樣你的網(wǎng)絡書簽（也就是IE中的“我的最愛”）就很難統(tǒng)一起來。打個比方，在辦公室個人電腦上用微軟的IE瀏覽器上網(wǎng)時，你將某個網(wǎng)站標注為“我的最愛”，可你家里那臺Mac電腦的蘋果Safari瀏覽器是不會自動將其標上書簽的。

    不過最近我試用了一個剛推出的免費新程序，該程序能夠幫你解決這個問題。它可以自動同步你每臺電腦中的網(wǎng)絡書簽，適用于Windows系統(tǒng)和Mac系統(tǒng)，涵蓋了IE、Safari和火狐(Firefox)等一眾主流瀏覽器。也就是說，在運行Windows XP或Vista系統(tǒng)的個人電腦上，它和IE和火狐瀏覽器兼容，也適用于Mac電腦的Safari和火狐瀏覽器。

    這個程序就是舊金山Foxmarks公司推出的Foxmarks系統(tǒng)。Foxmarks系統(tǒng)大約在2006年便已推出，不過當時僅適用于火狐瀏覽器，所以起了這么個名字。不過Windows系統(tǒng)也好，Mac系統(tǒng)也好，火狐都不是用戶最多的瀏覽器，所以Foxmarks公司決定將其擴展至Windows系統(tǒng)內置的IE瀏覽器（當然也是全世界用戶最多的瀏覽器）及Mac系統(tǒng)內置的Safari瀏覽器。

    這個新版軟件可以在foxmarks.com上下載，它不僅僅可以同步同一種瀏覽器不同版本的書簽，還可以同步不同瀏覽器的書簽，甚至Windows電腦和Mac電腦之間的書簽也能通過它實現(xiàn)同步。

    在我的測試中，F(xiàn)oxmarks運行效果很好，只有幾個微不足道的瑕疵。在試用了五天后，我在Windows電腦和Mac電腦上十二種不同版本的IE、火狐和Safari瀏覽器上已經(jīng)有了完全一樣的書簽，次序也完全一致。

    Foxmarks有分別針對這三種主流瀏覽器的版本，不過都對應于同一個設置有密碼的網(wǎng)絡賬戶，該賬戶中保留了用戶最近的書簽信息。你在任何一臺電腦的任何一種瀏覽器上添加、刪除、重命名或者重新排布書簽時，F(xiàn)oxmarks軟件都會把相關改變的信息發(fā)送至這個網(wǎng)絡賬戶。當你下一次通過其他瀏覽器查驗該網(wǎng)絡賬戶時，便會接收到修改的信息。

    比如，我在測試的時候，在我運行Vista系統(tǒng)的戴爾電腦上使用火狐瀏覽器登陸網(wǎng)站，給維基百科的一篇文章加了書簽。Foxmarks便在這臺戴爾電腦的IE以及我的蘋果Mac電腦的火狐和Safari瀏覽器中也都加了同樣的書簽。而且，維基百科這篇文章的書簽在兩臺電腦中的位置也是一致的。

    還有一次，我在一臺Mac電腦上調整了Safari瀏覽器的Bookmarks Bar中兩個書簽的次序，這個調序在Windows電腦IE的Links Toolbar和火狐Bookmarks Toolbar中都得到了體現(xiàn)。

    假使你并不需要同步每一臺電腦上的書簽，那你也可以在工作電腦和家用電腦上設置不同的書簽內容。

    你可以在任何一臺電腦（不是你自己的電腦也可以）上輸入密碼，進入保存有你的書簽信息的網(wǎng)頁，也可以通過iPhone或其他智能手機的瀏覽器進入這個網(wǎng)頁一個定制化的版本。你還可以創(chuàng)建手機網(wǎng)絡瀏覽器的書簽配置，不過手機的書簽無法做到同步。

    在這個網(wǎng)頁上，你可以變更原先設置的書簽，這些改動隨后會傳輸至你所用電腦的瀏覽器。你還可以通過電郵或RSS跟他人分享你的書簽。

    除了Foxmarks之外，還有其他一些網(wǎng)絡書簽工具，比如常見的Delicious書簽工具，不過據(jù)我所知，這些工具都無法實現(xiàn)自動同步不同瀏覽器及電腦之間的書簽，而這正是Foxmarks的主要功能。

    Foxmarks還有一個功能：可以將你存下的一些經(jīng)常使用的網(wǎng)站密碼進行同步。不過這個功能只適用于火狐瀏覽器，而且在我試用時，并不是每次都管用。

    該軟件還有其他幾個局限及不足。其用于IE瀏覽器的版本仍被標注為beta版或是測試版，因為它在同步IE書簽時偶爾還會出錯，在Vista系統(tǒng)中尤為如此。我在測試時就碰到了這樣的情況，所以我在Vista系統(tǒng)中使用Foxmarks時會特別地謹慎，不過它在Windows XP系統(tǒng)中表現(xiàn)還是很穩(wěn)定的。此外它目前僅適用于IE 6和IE 7版本，還不能夠支持最新的IE 8版本。

    在Mac電腦上，F(xiàn)oxmarks只適用于最新的Leopard操作系統(tǒng)和最新的Safari三版，不適用Safari的Windows版本。

    此外，同步也不是即時實現(xiàn)的。電腦需要一個小時后才能從網(wǎng)站處獲取到相關的變化信息。

    Foxmarks公司計劃繼續(xù)免費提供Foxmarks軟件，他們把盈利的希望寄托在未來的其他產(chǎn)品上。

    Foxmarks是一款設計巧妙的好產(chǎn)品，用戶通過它可以在多臺電腦、多種瀏覽器間有條不紊地享受網(wǎng)絡生活。