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How to delete all bookmarks in Firefox Desktop

  • 1 reply
  • 2 have this problem
  • 57 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

barzak
barzak
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Note: I always export all bookmarks to backup file and copy that to several safe locations for needed synchronization across different browsers and also restoring them if needed. Problem: I have repeatedly selected all items in Firefox bookmarks sub-folders and then followed by importing html bookmarks thinking that I was updating my bookmarks, so all my browsers had same. Instead, what I find is duplicated sets of bookmarks building up about 10-fold so that now any search for a site yields far too many duplicate listings and it is a mess. How do I prevent this from happening and how do I actually and truly delete all boomkarks in Firefox?

Aside topic: For all the folks who have accidentally lost bookmarks, my experience with losses has lead to always having backup files of bookmarks and backup listings in word or Excel of all my settings and extensions, etc. Automation has advantages, but it introduces new headaches. I can never allow myself to believe that everything will one day be just rosy. Also, multiple different browsers can be very helpful.

Note: I always export all bookmarks to backup file and copy that to several safe locations for needed synchronization across different browsers and also restoring them if needed. Problem: I have repeatedly selected all items in Firefox bookmarks sub-folders and then followed by importing html bookmarks thinking that I was updating my bookmarks, so all my browsers had same. Instead, what I find is duplicated sets of bookmarks building up about 10-fold so that now any search for a site yields far too many duplicate listings and it is a mess. How do I prevent this from happening and how do I actually and truly delete all boomkarks in Firefox? *** Aside topic: For all the folks who have accidentally lost bookmarks, my experience with losses has lead to always having backup files of bookmarks and backup listings in word or Excel of all my settings and extensions, etc. Automation has advantages, but it introduces new headaches. I can never allow myself to believe that everything will one day be just rosy. Also, multiple different browsers can be very helpful.

All Replies (1)

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
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Importing an HTML backup merges the bookmarks in the backup with the existing bookmarks what can lead to multiple copies of a bookmark, that is how importing an HTML backup works.

Do you have a JSON backup in the bookmarkbackups folder that only has your basic set?

The name of automatically created JSON bookmarks backups in the bookmarkbackups folder includes a total item count (folders and separators included) and an hash value to prevent saving the same backup more than once. You also see this count in the Library Restore menu drop-down list.

  • bookmarks-YYYY-MM-DD_<item count>_<hash>.jsonlz4.

You can rename/remove places.sqlite in the Firefox profile folder to remove all bookmarks and history (places.sqlite stores bookmarks and history).

If you want to keep history, then enter a character like a colon or a space in the search bar in the Library and remove all selected bookmarks.