Clean Out Dead Bookmark Links In Firefox And Internet Explorer

With the Internet being around as long as Al Gore  you probably have a million sites bookmarked in your browser. Sure at the time, you swear it was necessary so you can easily go back to the bookmark and visit that site.

But as time passes away, those old bookmarks that you never use, may actually be many dead links.

Instead of ignoring them, the utility AM-DeadLink provides automated detection of identifying dead links that can quickly trim the fat from your bookmarks.

AM-DeadLink (Aignesberger Software GmbH) is a free tool that will clean up dead links in Internet Explorer Favorites, Firefox, Opera and Netscape bookmarks.

To install, just download AM-DeadLink to your hard drive, then double click on the executable dlsetup.exe.

Once you see the first screen:

• Click Next
• Accept the Agreement and click Next
• Accept the default Destination Location (or choose another location) then click Next
• Accept the Start Menu Folder and click Next
• Add a Shortcut to your desktop and click Next

After installation has completed, AM-DeadLink will open. Depending on the number of browsers you have installed, the default browser bookmarks will automatically display.

To view another browser bookmarks, just click on the drop down arrow in the main toolbar (under the menu).

Notice that you can also open files such as CSV (Comma-Separated),Tab-delimited and URL type files. This can be useful if you have exported bookmarks from another Computer or a friends browser and you want to clean it up before importing.

Before you start, be aware that if you have a large list of bookmarks it may take a long time (hours) for the check to complete. Also you should backup the bookmarks of the browser you are checking, by selecting Backup from the menu.

To find dead links:

• Select your browser in the main toolbar
• Check the bookmark list by clicking the "Check" button in the toolbar. Once the check has completed, you can sort bookmarks by Error and Status columns. You can also select individual bookmarks by using the Shift and CTRL keys then pressing Ctrl+K.
• Validate dead bookmarks with your browser and delete any bookmarks if they are really dead. You can also right click on a link and display the site in the bottom window pane. To fix a bookmark, right click and select Properties and enter the correct URL.
• Save the list (for Internet Explorer, the bookmarks are deleted immediately).

AM-DeadLinks will keep a log of all bookmarks that you delete in the file named deadlink.log. Also when you save bookmarks, another log file is created and named extension _bak (files can be found in the installation directory or by searching).

A nice feature, is the capability to save the last check status between sessions (closing and re-open AM-DeadLink). This can be useful if you have a very large list of bookmarks which can take a long time (hours) to check each link.

By default this setting is enabled, but you change it (and make other configuration settings) by clicking on Options \ Settings and unchecking Save last check status between session.

A couple of tidbits:

If you need to restore deleted bookmarks or you want everything back, just unzip the backup file you created above (you did back them up…right!) then copy them into the bookmark location for the browser bookmarks you are restoring.

Even though the tool is free, you can get technical support at their forum.

As good as AM-DeadLink is, remember, it's not a bookmark organizer. It's main goal is to detect dead links.

And it does that very well.