Google released Google Browser Sync an extension for Firefox users to sync bookmarks, history, cookies, and saved passwords. I had been looking for something that could make it easy to sync different things on my computer. I had found a program called Syncopation to sync my iTunes library. MySync allows syncing of Mail, Address Book, iCal and Safari. I’m a Firefox user and these products only work on Mac OS X however and Google Browser Sync works on all platforms and syncs through my Google account as opposed to broadcasting like a server in my network.
This has it’s pros and cons. It’s a great method of keeping everything in sync. since the browser has to connect to the internet anyway it keeps the data away from my home network. In the case of disaster I could lose everything on my network at least I have some data stored offsite. If course I keep backups elsewhere but it just makes it one step easier. The bad thing about it is Google has your information. I had read articles that like its other products scans user data to retrieve information about its audience. I only sync bookmarks with the product. I don’t really care about the other information and I would rather type in the password when logging into my bank accounts than have Google store that for me.
Overall, the product works pretty well. It only managed to make a mistake once and lost one bookmark folder. I just had to resync with another machine that had that folder. Everything seems to work well now and stay in sync. I have it installed on one Linux machine, one Windows machine, and two Mac OS X machines. All worked together and makes one thing that much easier. I don’t mind Google looking through my bookmarks and if you have issues concerning privacy think about it before installing on your machine. If you are happy with how the product operates, give it a try it just works.
