Do you frequently find yourself copying and pasting “disposable” URLs into text files or notes programs for later use? I know that I do, whether its one-off sites that I need to perform a specific task (and therefore do not want to bookmark or share), or download links from services like Rapidshare, etc.
If you’re in the same boat then you will probably like this program: URLHistory is a small, free program that runs in the background and monitors your clipboard for URLs.
If found, URLHistory prompts the user for whether they would like to save the URL or not, and asks for an (optional) associated comment or label. Saved URLs can later be retrieved via the program’s icon in the system tray menu.
This program can be very useful to anyone who deals with a lot of disposable URLs; i.e. the kinds of links that you wouldn’t want to keep for recurrent use as bookmarks in your browser (much less share with other on social sites). Or you could use it as a simple bookmarking app; its up to you 😉
Here’s how this program works:
- Lives in the background, monitoring your clipboard taking up a mere 7 megs or so in memory.
Once it detects a URL in the clipboard prompts the user for a comment (see screenshot to the right)- It allows selecting and clipping multiple URLs at once, and will associate all of these with a single comment.
- You can access your URLs via right clicking on the app icon in the system tray menu (see top screenshot above). Clicking on a URL will open it in your default browser.
- URLs are stored in a simple text file that you can open and edit as needed.
PROS:
- Can be very useful, depending on your needs.
- Can clip multiple rows of links in one fell swoop, useful for file hosting type links
- Very light memory usage
CONS:
- If you’re clipping lots of URLs for some reason, with no intention of storing them, it can be annoying to be constantly prompted for whether you want them saved (though you can simply shut down the app in this case).
- Can sometimes lead to strange interactions in relation to Clipboard management type programs, or even programs that do a lot of clipboard management such as MS Excel.
The verdict: I’ve been using this for a while, and decided to write it up when I realized “hey, I really like this thing”. Its simple and decidedly low-tech compared to, say web clippers like Evernote or Scrapbook or cloud bookmarking type services like Instapaper or Read it Later; but it serves a different purpose anyway and does a great job.
Compatibility: WinAll
Note on downloading: this app was originally found on DonationCoder’s famous “Skrommel’s one hour software” page. However, I suggest you go to this page and download URLHistoryMod, a slightly modified version that contains a bug fix (approx 246K).
100% clean software: this is an AutoHotkey app and some anti malware apps erroneuosly have issues with AutoHotkey on occaision. It is 100% clean, though, as evidenced by it’s VirusTotal Profile.
