Avatar for Username

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

This thread was archived. Please ask a new question if you need help.

Sync is creating duplicate bookmarks

  • 5 replies
  • 3 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by Ibai

AlanMintaka
AlanMintaka
more options

Hello, I'm running sync in FireFox 10 on two PC's connected via LAN. The setup process went OK, but in the last few days I've noticed that I've started getting multiple copies of many of my bookmarks. Sync seems to be making copies all the time, rather than just syncing the bookmarks between the two PC's. How do I stop this from happening? Thanks for your time, Alan Mintaka

Hello, I'm running sync in FireFox 10 on two PC's connected via LAN. The setup process went OK, but in the last few days I've noticed that I've started getting multiple copies of many of my bookmarks. Sync seems to be making copies all the time, rather than just syncing the bookmarks between the two PC's. How do I stop this from happening? Thanks for your time, Alan Mintaka

Chosen solution

Hi Alan,

I've seen similar behaviors while using Firefox Sync in combination of Xmarks. Do you use any other service that allows you to sync the information in different browsers?

Read this answer in context 👍 0

All Replies (5)

Ibai
Ibai
  • Administrator
more options

Chosen Solution

Hi Alan,

I've seen similar behaviors while using Firefox Sync in combination of Xmarks. Do you use any other service that allows you to sync the information in different browsers?

AlanMintaka
AlanMintaka Question owner
more options

Hi lbai, I think that was the problem. The version of XMarks for Internet Explorer I was running was a standalone program. When I uninstalled it, the duplicating bookmark problem in FireFox went away. That's not a scientific conclusion regarding the exact cause, but the effect is clear.

It was a poser for me because I wasn't running Xmarks as an extension in the FireFox browser that was running FireFox Sync.

This means I can't run Xmarks as a standalone for Internet Explorer, but IE is not my browser of choice anyway. It's only there for the increasingly rare times when an application opens it to register a new product, install an update, etc. I can easily live without sync'd bookmarks on it, especially in favor of getting FireFox fixed.

So this may be a heads-up to anyone running that standalone copy of Xmarks for IE - it "could" be the reason you're having problems with bookmarks in FireFox sync.

Thanks for the suggestion!

Ibai
Ibai
  • Administrator
more options

Hi Alan!

It would be extremely beneficial if you could run the Xmarks application again and try to sync your browser to replicate the issue. Once you hit it, could you open a bug following the steps explained in the following article? https://philikon.wordpress.com/2011/06/13/how-to-file-a-good-sync-bug/

This way Firefox Sync developers will be able to look in detail to the cause and try to fix it.

Thanks in advance.

AlanMintaka
AlanMintaka Question owner
more options

Hey lbai, I'll give it a try...

But should this really be considered a FireFox bug? It's not like Mozilla is responsible for a standalone program installation for another browser (especially IE), even if a different version of that standalone is currently offered as an extension for FireFox. Technically they aren't the same two programs.

I would think it would be up to the Xmarks developers to keep their standalone program from interfering with non-targeted browser operations.

But that's why I'm not a FireFox developer. Let me see if I can cook anything up.

Ibai
Ibai
  • Administrator
more options

It could be an issue that the Firefox developers could help to block, but the team needs to look into the details of the log to understand what's exactly going on.

My take is that Xmarks is handling the bookmarks incorrectly but hopefully we can do something to block that.