You may need to update firefox

To do this go to firefox button > Help > About Firefox > Check for updates

and then follow the instructions below.

1. Use one of these methods to open the Bookmarks Library window:
   • Click the Firefox button to open the menu and click on Bookmarks.
   • Click the Bookmarks menu and click on Show All Bookmarks.
2. At the top of the Library window, click the "Import and Backup" menu and select Restore.
3. Click the date of the bookmark backup you want to recover.
4. In the new window that appears, click OK.
5. Your bookmarks from the selected date should now be restored.

For more information, see the Restore bookmarks from backup or move them to another computer article. For other solutions, see the Recover lost or missing Bookmarks article.

If this doesnt work(or hasnt) your places.sqlite may be messed up.

• refer to http://kb.mozillazine.org/Locked_or_damaged_places.sqlite for more

Please update to the current Firefox 22.0 release.

• Help > About Firefox

• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/update-firefox-latest-version.
• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Updating+Firefox

The Firefox 16 version that you currently run is no longer supported with security updates.

• It is important to update Firefox and add-ons to the latest version to get all security fixes.

The Firefox updater only updates to version 20. I have done that. I have then tried to restore bookmarks from a known good date - no joy. Nothing happens.

can you download the update from here, does it work now?

• https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/all/

Finally updated to version 22 but still no bookmarks. I've tried restoring from various dates when I know that the bookmarks were working but nothing happens.

did you check for a corrupt places.sqlite as i stated in my first post, then try to recover them again.

The places.sqlite issue is above my ability. I've used firefox for many years and have loved it but I think I'm going to have to abandon it and go to IE. I don't really like doing that but I really need my bookmarks and losing them is a major blow!

Thank you for your efforts, however. I appreciate it.

There is detailed info here => http://kb.mozillazine.org/Locked_or_damaged_places.sqlite#Problems_limited_to_bookmarks I really want to fix your problem.

See also:

• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Bookmarks+not+saved#w_fix-the-bookmarks-file

You can use this button to go to the Firefox profile folder:

• Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder (Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder)

Yes, the bookmarks are there!! How do I get them to show up when I click "Bookmarks"?

I followed the instructions above "•https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Bookmarks+not+saved#w_fix-the-bookmarks-file ". It gets to a point where it says to right click on places.sqlite. I find no such file when I do a search of all files.

You might need to Show hidden files, folders, and drives in Windows.

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/show-hidden-files-in-windows-7/

That standard setting in Windows hides files in the WIndows Explorer and in Search.

The instructions are incorrect in the http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/tutorials/show-hidden-files-in-windows-7/ file. when you click on "Control Panel" from the START menu you do not get a box as described. Instead you get a vertical list of about 60 things to choose from and" Appearance and Personalization" is not one of them so I'm stuck.

In your profile folder, instead of places.sqlite, delete places file.

Does not compute. I don't understand what you asked me to do. I was eventually able to see the places.sqlite file and it is NOT marked read only.

It doesn't matter whether the file is read-only or not. What matters is that the places.sqlite file can be corrupted and Firefox may not be able to update the database properly.

You can give it a try and move places.sqlite to another location or rename the files and delete all other places files if there are any present.
This should make Firefox rebuild the bookmarks from a JSON backup in the bookmarkbackups folder.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bookmarks_history_and_toolbar_buttons_not_working_-_Firefox
• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Bookmarks+not+saved#w_fix-the-bookmarks-file

Thanks to all who offered help. It has finally gotten too difficult for me to do all of the things suggested so I've switched to IE and am rebuilding "favorites" (as they call them) over there. Again thanks to all who tried to help.

Did you ever move or delete the places.sqlite file? That would likely had fixed your bookmark problem.

No, did not. There are other places.* files involved and confusing issues about them so I gave up. I suppose at this point there's no reason why I shouldn't delete places.sqlite since I won't be using Firefox anyway. I may try that.

Yep, just move them all to another folder, then try to restore bookmarks from backups.

• Restore bookmarks from backup or move them to another computer