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Firefox Sync is working backwards...

  • 11 svar
  • 1 har dette problem
  • 4 visninger
  • Seneste svar af AmGoth

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I have been using FF for years and *had* my browser set up perfectly. I got a new travel laptop and decided to install FF there and sync the settings from my main computer to the new laptop.

Unfortunately sync decided that my newly installed browser's settings were more important and removed all of my open tabs, history, settings, etc from my everyday browser.

This is super counter-productive; I've lost hours of work trying to relocate all of the browser windows I had open and getting all of the settings back to normal.

I rarely ever complain online about buggy software but this was so annoying I just had to.

Maybe consider disabling Sync until you can figure out how to either alert the user that all of their settings are about to be overwritten or provide an option to assign a particular browser as the master and all syncing begins from that.

I have been using FF for years and *had* my browser set up perfectly. I got a new travel laptop and decided to install FF there and sync the settings from my main computer to the new laptop. Unfortunately sync decided that my newly installed browser's settings were more important and removed all of my open tabs, history, settings, etc from my everyday browser. This is super counter-productive; I've lost hours of work trying to relocate all of the browser windows I had open and getting all of the settings back to normal. I rarely ever complain online about buggy software but this was so annoying I just had to. Maybe consider disabling Sync until you can figure out how to either alert the user that all of their settings are about to be overwritten or provide an option to assign a particular browser as the master and all syncing begins from that.

Ændret af AmGoth den

Alle svar (11)

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Hi AmGoth,

Sorry to hear you are having issues with Sync.

Have you tried to restore from Import and Backup?

See also : Restore bookmarks from backup or move them to another computer {link}

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Does FF automatically make backups on a regular basis? If not then I have nothing to import from.

If I have to rely on import/backups then Sync serves no real purpose.

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Firefox automatically makes backups of the bookmarks. These are stored in the bookmarkbackups folder.

Open the Bookmarks Manager; Press the Alt or F10 key to bring up the toolbar, and select Bookmarks. Hot key is <Control> (Mac=<Command>) <Shift> B.

Once the window is open, at the top of the page, press the button labeled Import and Backup. Select Restore. From the list, pick the file you want and click it.

The backups are stored in a jsonlz4 file named something like this; bookmarks-2016-06-29_1424_enD1GTH ya0JmicnYWg4V4g==.jsonlz4

In this example; 2016-06-29 = date created, 1424 = number of entries.

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/restore-bookmarks-from-backup-or-move-them

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/recover-lost-or-missing-bookmarks

https://support.mozilla.org/kb/forum-response-recover-bookmarks-after-update

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Back up and restore information in Firefox profiles.{web link} I use an add-on that makes backups of my user profile, Just In Case. Unfortunately, it is not compatible with the current Firefox.

Every now and then, open the profile folder and create a copy of the current profile as is to another location on your hard drive. This way you will have a backup.

If you do this each day, you will not lose much data. This should be done with Firefox Closed.

Note: In case you need to restore from these backups, you may need to overwrite old or corrupted files.

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I didn't lose bookmarks, not sure where that came from. I lost:

  • All open tabs (I had scores of them as I doing research on a subject for work)
  • All browser settings like 'Switch to new tab', download location, etc
  • All of my browsing history which I rely on a lot
  • My installed extensions

Again, If i have to make backups after every browser session then Sync has no useful purpose, at least not for me. I should not have relied on it, so my fault there.

Ændret af AmGoth den

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Sync is used to share information between systems/profiles. It is not meant as a backup service.

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FredMcD said

Sync is used to share information between systems/profiles. It is not meant as a backup service.

Exactly, not sure who started the whole backup conversation. Please read my post more thoroughly, I was not complaining about backups.

Not sure why I need to keep the thread on track, but again, Sync overwrote browser settings that it shouldn't have.

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And how does that help me with Sync erasing settings etc? I have already commented on how it is pointless to have Sync if I need to make backups of my [profile after every session to maintain browsing history etc.

Backups is not the answer. Fixing Sync is the answer.

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If you lost personal data then it is possible that a new default-release profile folder has been created. See "Determine if Firefox has created a new profile":

You can open the about:profiles page via the location bar to check whether multiple profiles are present and what profile Firefox currently is using.

Firefox 67 and later can use a dedicated profile for each of the Firefox update channels and will lock the profile, so it can only be used by Firefox in a specific installation folder. For Release versions this profile would be a xxxxxxxx.default-release profile, profiles used in older Firefox versions usually used a xxxxxxxx.default profile (a refresh adds a time stamp).

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That's the first thing I checked. No new profiles. Again, I didn't lose any bookmarks.