[HOWTO] - Sync your IE 5 Favorites in OS 9 and OS X

[yoshi]

Okay after lots of pissed off moments where I needed a bookmark I made in IE 5 in OS 9 and I was in OS X I finally did the hack that should help everyone. I am listing detailed instructions on how to have the same Favorites, Histories, and Toolbar links in OS 9 and in OS X. Note I used IE 5.1.3 on Both OS 9 and OS X so if you haven't upgraded to 5.1 in OS 9 I cannot guarantee this will work for you completely. So here are the instructions.

1) Go into your preferences folder in your OS 9 System Folder.

2) Look for the folder named "explorer" (without quotes)

3) Make an alias of the following files:
History.html
Favorites.html
Downloads.html
Toolbar.xml

4) Move these files to the desktop and close all the windows to make room.

5) Double click your Hard Drive with OS X on it and in the upper toolbar click on the "home" button (without quotes)

6) Go into the Library Folder and then into Preferences

7) Look for the folder "explorer" (without quotes)

8) Delete the following files:
History.html
Favorites.html
Downloads.html
Toolbar.English.xml

9) Remember the alias's we moved to the desktop? Well move those into this folder and make sure to remove the word "Alias" from them.

10) Rename the file Toolbar.xml to Toolbar.English.xml After that close all the windows and start up IE.

You should now have the same favorites, downloads in your download manager, same toolbar favorites, and same history. This will change with use from either IE 5.1 in OS 9 or OS X. If you have any questions please ask. Like I said at the beginning I used IE 5.1.3 in both OS 9 and OS X and I don't know if this will work with 5.0 so upgrade as its free and if you can run 5.0 on your mac you can run 5.1.

Hope this helps some people

`Dave

[ddma]

Yea, I use the similar method to sync. my ICQ pref. and it just works fine!

[jca]

Just a bit of warning about using an alias for IE bookmarks. Apparently, OS X doesn't like using an alias to share with OS 9. I recently lost all of my bookmarks (in both OS 9 and OS X) because of this setup. (And I've heard of others with this problem.)

As always, your mileage may vary.

[yoshi]

I have been using this config for a few weeks now with no issues.. maybe you did it wrong although I don't see how..

`Dave

[scope]

I did the inverse of this (put the X bookmarks into 9) and I notice that IE doesn't keep the cookies anymore. Anybody else have this problem?

[yoshi]

Originally posted by jca
Just a bit of warning about using an alias for IE bookmarks. Apparently, OS X doesn't like using an alias to share with OS 9. I recently lost all of my bookmarks (in both OS 9 and OS X) because of this setup. (And I've heard of others with this problem.)

As always, your mileage may vary.

Are you using a seperate partition or hard drive for this?

`Dave

[jca]

No, I'm not using a separate partition. And to the other poster, no I'm not "doing it wrong". I've seen this problem/gotcha mentioned in other forums.

It worked for me without any problems for a while, and then the bookmarks were wiped. This cannot be traced to any other factors. I've seen this same outcome mentioned in other forums.

Regardless, make a backup of your bookmarks/files/etc.

[yoshi]

Originally posted by jca
No, I'm not using a separate partition. And to the other poster, no I'm not "doing it wrong". I've seen this problem/gotcha mentioned in other forums.

It worked for me without any problems for a while, and then the bookmarks were wiped. This cannot be traced to any other factors. I've seen this same outcome mentioned in other forums.

Regardless, make a backup of your bookmarks/files/etc.

Okay coupled with the above posts the only other logical question is did you update after you did this hack because I still have my favorites. I don't know but I do notice that X is picky about sym links between drives but not on the same drive. Ah well I will experiment more on my iBookX.

`Yoshi