Hi Gail, I'm sorry to hear that your Refresh did not work as it should have.

Was there a problem with Firefox that motivated you to do the Refresh?

The Refresh, if it ran to completion without interruption, should have created a new folder on your Windows desktop named Old Firefox Data. Do you have that folder?

Thank you for replying. Yes, Firefox was so sluggish and I had already did a restart and I seriously thought the refresh would work. Well, it is now running so smoothly but minus things I was used to having. I will be able to accumulate bookmarks and the history doesn't matter that much.

In answer to your question, yes there is a new folder so I am guessing I should open and see what is going on?

Gail

Ok, I did open the folder but of course I understand nothing at all. Only three items listed, two file folders and a JPG.

Sorry I didn't open the folder and check before replying.

Gail

One of the folders in Old Firefox Data will be your very recent profile folder with all your important data. You can migrate over a few files by copy/pasting them from the old profile folder to the current one. Firefox needs to be closed while you're doing this or there will be a conflict.

Source Folder

In Old Firefox Data, double-click into one of the profile folders and see whether it is the more recently updated one. For example, look in the bookmarkbackups folder to see how recent the backups are (the creation date should be part of the file name).

The latest profile folder will be your source. I suggest making this File Explorer window about half the width of the screen and placing it on the left side of the monitor.

Leaving that window open, switch back to Firefox.

Destination Folder

We'll use Firefox to open the current profile folder, since it is buried way down in the file system. Either:

• "3-bar" menu button > "?" Help > Troubleshooting Information
• (menu bar) Help > Troubleshooting Information
• type or paste about:support in the address bar and press Enter

This is the Troubleshooting Information page. In the first table, find the Profile Folder row, and click the "Open Folder" button. This should launch a new window listing various files and folders in Windows File Explorer. Move this window to the right side of the screen.

Leaving that window open, switch back to Firefox and Exit, either:

• "3-bar" menu button > Exit
• (menu bar) File > Exit

Files to Copy/Paste

In the File Explorer window on the left, you can right-click > Copy the older file, then in the File Explorer window on the right, you can right-click and blank area next to the list and Paste that file to replace the newer less useful one.

IMPORTANT: make sure you aren't accidentally replacing your older files. If in doubt, make a backup.

(1) Bookmarks and History

This is stored in a pair of database files:

• places.sqlite -- stores addresses, etc.
• favicons.sqlite -- stores site icons

(2) Saved Logins

If applicable -- again there is a pair of files that need to travel together:

• logins.json
• key4.db

When you start Firefox again, it should use the transferred files from your old profile. Any luck?

This article has more info on the various other files in the folder: Recovering important data from an old profile.

I know I am late in replying. My daughter died and I just trying to get back to normal again although I know that doesn't happen. But I did want to tell you that I appreciate the time you took and trouble you went through to help me and that all is well now. Mozilla Firefox is working great. All I am trying to do right now is to make sure you know that your suggestions worked and the help you provided is appreciated. It took me several minutes to figure out how to reply to you so that you would at least know.

Thank you again,

Gail

Hi Gail, thank you for the update and I'm sorry to hear about your loss. Certainly forum niceties need to wait under such circumstances.

Hello jscher2000 - I too made the same mistake - hit the "refresh" button, because I got a Firefox warning that it was running slow (and it did seem so). I could swear that before I did, it told me it would keep all my settings and bookmarks and toolbars, but of course it did not. I followed your instructions above (copied the most recent BOOKMARKBACKUPS file into the correct (same) folder in the new Firefox folder, as well as the other four files you mentioned: places.sqlite, favicons.sqlite, logins.json, and key4.db. Did I miss anything? When I restart Firefox I get a big red bar across the top with the error message, "The bookmarks and history system will not be functional because one of Firefox's files is in use by another application. Some security software can cause this problem." In reading the error message screen, it seems to imply that anti-virus software could be interfering (because I have nothing else open). I have Norton installed, I have always had Norton installed, and it always worked. So can you help me understand what to do? So many bookmarks and my toolbars are gone (well, they're in the Old FIrefox folder at least). Thank you, Andy (BTW, I tried a Win10 System Restore, back 12 hours, but that didn't help).

Hi list1, you should be able to restore bookmarks (without history or site icons) even without places.sqlite and favicons.sqlite. That was the reason for transferring the bookmarkbackups folder. To try it, see the steps in this article:

Fix "The bookmarks and history system will not be functional" error message

I'm not sure what you mean by toolbars here:

So many bookmarks and my toolbars are gone (well, they're in the Old FIrefox folder at least).

In case you mean that the Bookmarks Toolbar and/or Menu Bar are no longer displayed, you can turn them back on using the toolbars list. Either:

• right-click (on Mac Ctrl+click) a blank spot on the tab bar (or the "+" button)
• (menu bar) View > Toolbars
  On Windows, tap the Alt key to activate the menu bar temporarily.
• in Customize mode > Toolbars button (see: Customize Firefox controls, buttons and toolbars)

To turn on the Bookmarks Toolbar, Menu Bar, or other bars, click it on the list.

Hello, I am completely lost. Every Help link I click seems to take me to a Help page with more links, its like going down a rabbit hole. I was looking at creating a new profile, can I do that and just import my Old Files? Can I remove Firefox and use the Old Files as a the source for setup?

When I said the Bookmarks and Toolbars are missing, yes, what I mean was, the toolbar across the top, with 10 Bookmark subjects listed (the ones I click to see a dropdown of bookmarks), is missing. When I try to turn on the Bookmarks, its empty. Everything is empty. I have copied those 4 files you mentioned, and the entire Bookmarksbackup folder and pasted them all into the appropriate place in the path (they ask if I want to replace them, I say yes). Question - should my latest bookmarkbackups file only have 96kb, for hundreds of bookmarks? It seems small. The favicons and places files are over 50,000kb each, so that seems logical.

BTW, I have disabled Norton while I'm doing this, both the Auto-Protect and Firewall, yet I still get that error message in the red bar that says the file is in use elsewhere.

Would going back farther on a Windows System Restore help?

This is very frustrating, please advise.

Thank you Andy

Hi Andy, are you still getting the error about the bookmarks and history not being functional, or has that cleared up? If you still have that problem, Firefox is having trouble with either the places.sqlite file or the favicons.sqlite file. One possible way to identify which file is the problem is to run the "Verify Integrity" function. That's here:

Open Firefox's Troubleshooting Information page using any of these methods:

• "3-bar" menu button > "?" Help > Troubleshooting Information
• (menu bar) Help > Troubleshooting Information
• type or paste about:support in the address bar and press Enter

Near the bottom, there is a section titled Places Database -- that's the file which stores history and bookmarks. Click the button labeled Verify Integrity. There may be a 10-15 second delay before results appear.

If all is well, the report that appears below the button should start with:

> Task: checkIntegrity
+ The places.sqlite database is sane
+ The favicons.sqlite database is sane

Does yours say that, or something else? You can select and copy the report, and then paste it into a reply for review and comment.

Here is what I'm getting when I do that procedure (and its instant, no delay):

> Task: checkIntegrity - Unable to fix corruption, places.sqlite will be replaced on next startup > Task: invalidateCaches - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task. > Task: checkCoherence - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task. > Task: expire - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task. > Task: originFrecencyStats - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task. > Task: vacuum - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task. > Task: stats - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task. > Task: _refreshUI - The task queue was cleared by an error in another task.

Yes, still getting the red bar with the message about "bookmarks and history system will not be functional because one of Firefox's files is in use by another application. Some security software can cause this problem". As I said, previously, I disabled Norton, but still got that message. its reactivated now, but I can turn if off again.

I wonder if its possible just to copy the folder, "alndl7h2.default" from the Old Firefox Data folder, and paste it over the new version I'm seeing, and I guess, replace everything?

Thanks, Andy

> Task: checkIntegrity - Unable to fix corruption, places.sqlite will be replaced on next startup

Does Firefox seem to be doing that on the next startup, fixing the issue, or the issue continues after restarting Firefox?

I wonder if its possible just to copy the folder, "alndl7h2.default" from the Old Firefox Data folder, and paste it over the new verson I'm seeing, and I guess, replace everything?

Sort of, but take a look at the detailed steps for the "Transplant Method" in the following thread: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1307435#answer-1356183

If you are not running Windows and need help adapting that to Mac or Linux, you might go ahead and raise that in the other thread.

I am on Win 10. I can't tell if Firefox is replacing anything on the next startup. The places.sqlite file in my Old Firefox Data folder is about 51,000kb and the one in the current path is 5,120kb, and is newer, dated 10-31 an hour after the old one.

I'll look at the Transplant Method while I wait for your reply.

Andy

OK, got it all back using the Transplant Method. One problem was that to view your instructions, I had Firefox open, and every time I tried pasting the folder into the /profiles it would stop and tell me a file (didn't say which) couldn't be pasted because it was in use. So I printed out the instructions, closed Firefox and just did the copy & paste in Win Explorer, then started Firefox and it was fine from the get-go, didn't have to create a new profile at all.

That was by far the easiest and most logical way, although I'm having to re-enter passwords, but that's nothing. Also, most of my home page "Top Sites" are missing, but again I can re-create those. I really appreciate your help, but I have to wonder what they were thinking when they encourage people to hit "Refresh" (it said my Firefox was running slow), and promising to save all my bookmarks and settings, and then make me go through this. They should either do what it said, or have a "Restore Previous Data" button, that would let the user choose the folder in the Old Firefox Data folder. Also, I don't know if having Norton running mattered, but I did disable it.

Anyway, thank you again, saved my butt for sure. Andy