Transmute Pro
Transmute Pro
Reviewed June, 210
What’s It Do?

Transmute Pro is a cross-platform universal bookmark converter to allow transferring bookmarks, or favorites, between the latest Web browser bookmark formats such as Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Internet Explorer, Opera, Apple Safari, Konqueror, Chromium, Flock, SeaMonkey and XBEL. It works with leading bookmark Web services such as Delicious and Google Bookmarks and allows the user to synchronize, sort, organize and remove duplicates and more. Transmute Pro is a portable application and runs on Windows, Linux and Mac OS X.


Does it do what it promises?

Reviewer 1 - Name Withheld By Request: No. My impression from reading this program's description on the Transmute Web site was that this program could perform maintenance on bookmarks, such as removing dead links and redundant bookmarks. It can only do these functions within the context of performing a sync between two sets of bookmarks or by performing the undocumented "kludge" of setting up "a sync with the same Source & Target, the Action as "Mirror" and the duplicate/dead link removal settings as required". I attempted to run this program in this mode on a large set of Firefox bookmarks and it did not complete this task.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: Yes it will copy, convert, backup, and synchronize one's bookmark collection; but it fails to accurately identify dead links.

Reviewer 3 - Dana Bostick: Transmute Pro is an application that purportedly allows one to synchronize bookmarks across multiple browsers. The list of supported browsers is extensive, including all of the major players such as Google Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari and Flock as well as Google Bookmarks & Delicious.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: The Web Site makes only a single claim: that Transmute Pro is " a . . . way to manage your bookmark collections. . . as easily as you manage your files." Actually, I might suggest that managing one's bookmarks using Transmute is easier than managing one's files. Unfortunately, it is what it does not promise, i.e., technical support, that is Transmute's downfall.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle: Yes, to an extent. With Transmute Pro I was able to synchronize all my bookmarks between four different browsers; however, I found some weaknesses in the program, where it did not function as I had expected.


Was it easy to install?

Reviewer 1 - Name Withheld By Request: Installation on my PC was straightforward. My only concern with the license agreement was a clause stating that the terms could be changed at any time without notice.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: The 3.67 MB downloaded zip file installed without any problems or conflicts.

Reviewer 3 - Dana Bostick: Yes, it will run on computers running Windows operating systems. It supports Windows 98 or higher, both 32-bit and 64-bit versions. Transmute Pro requires Microsoft .NET Framework v.2.0 or higher. This framework is already included with Windows Vista, Windows 7 and higher. It may have to be installed on operating systems older than Windows Vista to get Transmute Pro to run. The actual installation was quite simple and involved downloading the zipped install files from the site, unzipping the package and running the installer.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: Yes. It is an unusually small 3.80MB file download as a ZIP file which took mere seconds to download on a reasonably fast broadband connection and requiring only slightly more disc space. Unfortunately, unless it is already installed, one must download the humongous 245.6MB (yes, 200!) Microsoft .NET Framework to use this program. If this is the case, the installation will be anything but easy or fast. Installation was unusually fast and smooth using the now standard MSI (Microsoft) install wizard as was the registration process. The program seemed to integrate seamlessly into the Windows operating system. It did install itself into my start menu without asking and installed icons, again without asking-something to which I object. Nonetheless, it was a quick and clean installation with no real configurations necessary, and uninstalled easily and cleanly as well. There is a standard EULA (End User License Agreement) offering a single user license and the now standard notice declining any liability.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle: Yes, it is a standard Windows installation process that allowed me to place the program files in the location of my choice. It automatically put shortcuts in the Start Menu and on the desktop. When I first started the program, I noticed that it was in Demo Mode, and that any bookmark collections would not be saved. I thus had to register the program immediately for it to be any particular use. This was a simple copy-and-paste operation, but as soon as it thanked me for registering, it promptly shut down.

The EULA (End Users License Agreement) states that "A single user license use is limited to one computer per purchased license" . Many users have to access their work at a desktop computer, and a laptop; for them, such a policy is unduly restrictive.

In addition, there is a very worrying statement concerning support as follows: "... nothing in this EULA entitles you to any support, maintenance, or new versions of the SOFTWARE. You may contact Darq Software to determine the availability of support, maintenance, and new versions of the SOFTWARE, and the fees, terms, and conditions that would apply." Any program which states that its producer has no obligation to provide support to people who have purchased a license should be avoided.


Good points.

Reviewer 1 - Name Withheld By Request: The "explorer-like" view of bookmarks is clear and makes it easy to make individual changes in bookmarks or folders.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: It is very easy to learn how to use Transmute Pro. It has only two user interface sections, an Explore section to view and edit bookmarks and a Tools section to copy, convert, synchronize, and validate bookmarks. I was able to start using Transmute Pro as soon as I installed the program. The interface and terms used are self explanatory. This is a good thing since there is no manual on how to use Transmute Pro and the help file provides only the simple basics of what each function does.

The Explore function of Transmute Pro is much faster than Windows Explorer while keeping the general layout of Windows Explorer that users are accustomed to. Transmute Pro allows the user to rate each bookmark on a 5 star rating system. Tags, keywords, description, and notes can be added to a bookmark through Transmute Pro's Explore function although such tags and other notes are viewable only through Transmute Pro. The Explore function can also display when one last visited or validated the Web site of a bookmark. With the Explore function of Transmute Pro I was able to quickly organize my bookmarks.

The synchronize function performs the task of bringing bookmarks on two different computers as exact copies. This was a nice feature in that the efforts of organizing my bookmarks on one PC were shared with another PC without much extra effort. I used the filters (tags and keywords) to selectively create a group and thus help in organizing my bookmarks.

Reviewer 3 - Dana Bostick: The Transmute program is quite useful if one runs several different browsers. Keeping bookmarks synchronized is always a challenge and Transmute can help do this.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: Simply put, Transmute is a utility to convert, transfer, manage, and sync bookmarks across various platforms as well as between nearly all browsers-thirteen to be exact, including the Linux KDE browser. Unfortunately, for those still using AOL, and I know there are still millions of AOL users, it will not work with AOL and AOL "Favorites," i.e. bookmarks. Beyond this general overview and those features available in most all such programs, there are some noteworthy features:

dot Simplicity. This is truly an easy-to-use one-click operation. Simply select the browser for the bookmarks to transfer (source) and the target browser where there are to be sent, click once, and they are converted and transferred;

dot The user is given the choice whether to overwrite the bookmarks at the target source as well as to create a backup of your bookmarks, both of which are checked by default;

dot One can also manage and synchronize bookmarks on social sites such as Delicious.

dot The program's GUI (Graphic User Interface) is attractive, streamlined, and simple;

dot The program is very light on resources, using an inconsequential amount of memory or CPU, and thus should work fine on older and less powerful machines; and,

dot I transferred bookmarks between Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera, and Google Chrome with no trouble. The transfers were very fast and the results were accurate.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle: I have been using a separate program as a Bookmarks manager, so I do not often use the favorites feature of the three different browsers that I use. To test Transmute Pro, I exported all my bookmarks into a new "favourites" folder on my hard drive. Transmute Pro easily found and imported all my bookmarks into the Favorites of Internet Explorer. From there, I was able to transfer them into the Bookmarks folders of both Firefox and Opera.

The opening screen of the program presents a choice of all active browsers. Clicking on any of the browsers , it will open the "collection" of bookmarks for navigation to any site associated with the bookmark.

Sometime after I had installed Transmute Pro, I downloaded and installed the Chrome browser. The next time that I opened Transmute Pro, Chrome had been added to the list. Like the others, I was able to import all my links into Chrome.

I had to contact product support on two occasions. In spite of the warning in the EULA mentioned above, in each case, they replied within 48 hours, and dealt with my questions courteously and effectively. Since support is such a critical part of the service that should be offered to all who purchase software, I hope that they will revise the disclaimer that they do not undertake to provide support, to bring it in line with their practice --at least, as far as I experienced it.


Weak points.

Reviewer 1 - Name Withheld By Request: In order to start running Transmute Pro, the browser that utilizes the bookmarks must be closed; otherwise, an error message is generated stating that the file is locked. I found this to be a major impediment in using this program since I almost always have a browser running when my computer is up.

The help file is very sketchy. The publishers seem to assume a greater user knowledgebase than I believe is justified. For example, they list in their set of features a set of functions that their program can perform, such as deleting redundant bookmarks; however, this function is not explained except in the "Sync" section.

The only sign that activity is taking place when a sync is in progress is a blue progress bar at the bottom of the screen. Some text detailing what is being done and how far it has progressed would be nice. With an extensive bookmark collection, I found it nearly impossible to tell whether the job was proceeding or if it had stalled with just the small graphic.

Once it gets about 80% of the way through a sync, Transmute Pro displays a preview of what has been synced. It would be far more useful if there was some description of which bookmarks had been set for deletion, especially if the user was given some control over the changes.

I let Transmute do a mirror sync with the options to remove dead links and redundant bookmarks on my rather extensive set of Firefox bookmarks. It reached the preview display at around the 80% mark and then seemed to freeze. Task manager showed that it was still running, but this was the only sign of life for hours. I let it run overnight and then some more, but finally terminated it after around 16 hours when there were no signs of progress.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: Instructions are very basic and depend upon the user having knowledge that many novices would not have. There are no examples of how to perform the different tasks or screen shots showing how to make the settings to obtain a desired outcome. I copied my bookmarks to another folder to test Transmute Pro and was very glad I did as my first attempts in using Transmute Pro did not obtain the results I desired. One of the features touted by Transmute Pro is automatic backups in case one does not like the changes made. Other than listing this feature, there are no instructions on how to use the automatic backup to undo any changes.

I was very concerned with the EULA that stated that by accepting the EULA for Transmute Pro the user also accepts any third party software that Draq decides to include with Transmute Pro. A user should have total control of what is installed on their PC without the addition of other unknown software. It makes no difference if installing Transmute Pro did not install unknown spyware or adware; it is giving Draq the legal right to do so by agreeing to the EULA for Transmute Pro.

The validate function to check for dead links is prone to false positive results. I found numerous good links that Transmute Pro classified as dead links. As soon as Transmute Pro determined a link as dead, I could click that link and the Web page displayed immediately. I tested this quite often to rule out any response delay as cause for the dead link determination.

I suggest changes be made so that the Favicons (icons for a bookmark placed there by the Web site) are saved when copying or validating your bookmarks. I lost all my Favicons by performing an in-place validation. Using Favicons speeds the selection of a bookmark from a list.

Reviewer 3 -Dana Bostick: The EULA is quite restrictive and not at all user-friendly. Several statements contained in it raised a red flag for me, such as "EULA revisions/changes may be made at any time without prior notice" as well as a "Disclaimer of Support" and a "Disclaimer of Warranty". The comment that "accepting the EULA auto accepts "additional terms and conditions", without any explanation of what those additional terms and conditions might be, was most egregious in my view.

These days, most own more than one computer, typically a desktop system and a laptop. Unfortunately, Transmute Pro is restricted to one computer per license.

The "Help" option from within the program is basically less than useful. I found it difficult to make a connection between the written instructions and actually using the program. It offers very little actual help and basically only lists what Transmute is supposed to be able to do with no real guidance on how to actually use it. It appears that the author assumes that the user has much more knowledge of the Windows file system than most have. There were no online help resources, user forums or tutorials available, and the only help is via e-mail through a contact form available on the Web site. A usable and detailed help system and a few video tutorials would take a significant load off the resources and staff of Darq Software, not to mention making the program much easier to use.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: There was only one major and two minor weaknesses in the program and one item that I would question.

dot By default, the overwrite option is checked for transferring bookmarks from one browser to another. There is a warning box that popups a warning that proceeding will result in overwriting all previous bookmarks at the target browser which, I assume, would eliminate any bookmarks exclusive to or only on that browser. As I would think most people would not want to lose bookmarks that they already had, I do not understand why this is checked by default;

dot A minor weakness is in the absent Help file. Other than a very basic FAQ on the Web site, there is no help of any kind available. This is further aggravated or compounded by the following point;

dot A minor weakness is that it relies on the bloated and resource pig known as Microsoft .Net Framework (v2.0 or higher, .NET 3.5 SP1 recommended) that must be installed to use this program; and

dot Lack of technical support is a major weakness. In the "Contact" listing on the Web Site there is an email form for which one can "ask questions, offer comments, make suggestions;" but, there is no specific offer of technical support nor any sense of turn around time for questions to be answered. My one email went unanswered.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle: Transmute Pro does not have a search function to quickly navigate to any of the bookmarks using keywords or some other search parameter.

A valuable feature in a bookmark manager is the ability to quickly check whether the URLs are still valid or if they are "dead" links. This is an option in Transmute Pro that can be chosen when setting up a profile or activity for the program to run; however, I did not find this function to work well, and invalid URLs were transferred from one browser to the other.

Transmute's support advise me that both features, global search and global validation, are in development, and that they should be included in a future release of the program.

Transmute Pro is not a very difficult program to use but the Help file to be somewhat sparse. Where it does go into detail, it is too technical and not really useful. For example, a new user who is not particularly familiar with the terms of the program could use some information on, for example, the difference between "Project" and "Activity", and how Transmute Pro uses these concepts. There needs also to be more information about using the program, particularly the use of the Tools, the editing functions, the ratings, the use of tags, keywords, etc. These are all features of the program, but I found no mention of them in the Help file.

Some of these modules did not work, or work as I expected they would. For example, after I have visited a site, I would expect the Features in Transmute called : "Visited," "Visits" and "Validated" to automatically fill in with the time and date. Not only does that not happen, but when I click on the edit button, two of the three automatically filled in "January 01, 1970, 12:00:00 AM." The Visits field remained empty; however, with no mention of these features in the Help file, I may be completely misunderstanding them and how to use them.


Developer's Web site.

Reviewer 1 - Name Withheld By Request: The Web site is very sketchy. There is a list of the features of this program, but I could not find a forum or other support beyond a very basic FAQ.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: The Web site s simple and straight forward with the exception of the URL (www.gettransmute.com) that shows that the entire Web site is dedicated to selling this one program in different levels. Navigation is simple, but there are very few pages to navigate. The FAQ section is difficult to locate since it is included on the product's page rather than in the support page.

Reviewer 3 - Dana Bostick: The Web site at http://www.gettransmute.com is clean and uncluttered. It gets straight to the point with the upper third of the home page dedicated to a pitch to either download or purchase Transmute Pro. The lower section has three columns that explain what the program does, what browsers it supports and a small blurb on the Android version offered. The products page simply lists variations of the software, the downloads page offers a comparison table of the different versions available as well as links to details on the various versions and a listing of available language files that transmute comes in. Lastly, the contact page is a very basic Web contact form through which one can contact Darq Software with questions, comments or suggestions.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: The Web site is attractive but has mistaken simplicity for usefulness. Other than a very brief and abbreviated explanation of what the program does, the download page, and the purchase page there is nothing there: no Help files, no tutorials, no demonstrations, no documentation. There is not even a privacy statement available. Even more worrisome to me is that there is no way of knowing who the developer Darq Software is as there is nothing about the company or where it is located. I have never seen so little information on a software developer's Web site.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle. Like the program and the Help file, the Transmute Web site is very simple. The single product site contains all the basic information needed to promote, sell and support the program. My personal preference would to be to reduce the size of the banner that appears at the top of all the pages, as I find that it takes up too much of the screen. On the positive side, the site does not accost the visitor with flashy and flashing graphics, inflated "evaluations," lists of "prizes and awards" and all the other annoyances of many other commercial sites.

Still, the site is too basic. In particular, there should be a Support section. This could include the present "Contact" page, but could then be greatly expanded. If the Help file is kept deliberately simple, the Support section of the site should contain more in-depth information about the advanced features and hidden modules of the program.

Transmute Standard is a freeware version of the program. Those who are interested in testing out the main features of Transmute will find this to be a good introduction as are the demo versions of either Transmute Plus or Transmute Pro, if additional functions are needed. There is a comparison of the three versions on the Download page of the Web site.

The Web site also mentions a portable package that allows using Transmute from a USB drive. There are also "unsupported" versions that can be used in Linux or Mac OS X.


Other comments.

Reviewer 1 - Name Withheld By Request: Support appears to be limited to filling out a Web-based email form. I received a reply to my email inquiries in about two days on average.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: Unless a user has a large number of bookmarks, uses several different browsers, or uses more than one PC; Transmute Pro will not be of much help and definitely not worth the $29.99 price tag.

Reviewer 3 - Dana Bostick: Transmute Pro was more of a "duplication process" than a synchronization of bookmarks or "Favorites".

I consider myself to be somewhat of a power user and will usually just jump in and start using a new application after a short exploratory period. This gives me a feel for how user-friendly and intuitive a program's interface is to the average user. After running Transmute Pro against my bookmark sets in Internet Explorer, Firefox and Google chrome, I basically ended up with triple or more bookmark folders in each list. (I used a folder system to organize my bookmarks ) For Internet Explorer I did not end up with multiple listings of folders but each URL in the folder had as many as five duplications. This took me quite some time to get sorted out. There is supposed to be a function within the program to eliminate duplications but I could never get it to successfully complete. One attempt ran for several hours in the background and never finished. Obviously, my normal usage style wasn't going to work in this case. I was eventually able to "synchronize" bookmarks between browsers, but the process was far from intuitive and took some time to work out.

By trial and error I discovered I actually needed to use Transmute Pro's Activity Editor to create a new profile to control how Transmute Pro was going to work. Transmute Pro uses a wizard style step-through process to create a "Profile" in order to control the process it will use to synchronize the bookmarks or favorites. Under the "Tools" menu on the left side of the screen is a single selection called "Sync". This opens a blank screen with a few icons on the top of the window and some navigation buttons on the right side. In the center of the screen it says "click here to add an activity". Clicking on the screen opens the "Activity Editor" that will step the user through creating a new profile. There are multiple tabs and options to customize the process for one's needs.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: This developer has all the markings of a freeware developer who decided to add a couple of additional features to an already excellent free program in order to sell a shareware version. I have no objections to anyone wanting to make money, but I do think that one offering shareware should take his business to a higher level and, at a very minimum, offer more visible support, help files, demonstrations, documentation, and so on. And .NET Framework for a bookmark manager?

As a result of this lack of support along with a price of $29.95 which is far too high for the difference between the Pro and free versions, I cannot recommend this software.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle: I have always used more than one browser and needed an easy way to copy the bookmarks from one browser to the other, then quickly accessing Web pages, and sort and rearrange bookmarks. Transmute Pro does offer these functions, and does them quite well. In addition, it is not very expensive, although I do regret that purchase of a license is limited to one computer only.

However, for some time I have been using a separate bookmark manager. This program keeps all my bookmarks independently from any of my browsers. From this program, I can go directly to any address in the list, calling up whichever one of the browsers that I wish to use at that time for that address. Although I did export my list of addresses from this program to be incorporated and used by Transmute Pro, I will stay with my current bookmark manager. From my experiences with Transmute, it is still a work-in-progress. The Search and validation features mentioned in "Weak Points" above are both essential functions that mark a robust bookmark manager. Detailed information about all aspects of the program need to be easily available. A much better support policy needs to be enunciated and implemented. Until these items have been improved, I would only recommend the free Standard version.
Will you continue to use it?

Reviewer 1- Name Withheld By Request: No. Overall, my use of this program was frustrating and the results quite unsatisfactory.

Reviewer 2 - Dana Cardwell: No, for my purposes it took more time to use Transmute Pro than to perform the functions manually. My main use for Transmute Pro would be to test for dead links and I found Transmute Pro to be unreliable for this purpose.

Reviewer 3 - Dana Bostick: No. Transmute Pro could be a workable solution for someone who does not already have a solution to this issue. In my case, I already have a workable solution and don't need this application.

Reviewer 4 - Mark Snyder: No.

Reviewer 5 - Peter Royle: No. It will not replace my current bookmark manager program.

OPERATING SYSTEMS USED IN THIS REVIEW
Windows XP Pro, XP Home, XP Media Center Edition

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