I have successfully exported (and backed up) my bookmarks, but Firefox will not import the html file and also will not restore the bookmarks from the backup.
I have created an html backup (and a backup json file) o my bookmarks in the desktop folder of my old machine, and then transferred it to my new PC (running Win 10 Pro, Firefox 48.0.2). I have tried both restore from backup and importing the html file with no results. When trying to restore from the json file I get this error: "Unable to process the backup file". When trying to import the html file, when you click on "open the file", nothing happens. When I open the json with notepad, all the bookmarks are there as they are supposed to be in one continuous string of text. If I open the html file, it opens in firefox as a web page and all bookmarks show up as links. It appears the backup and export are working properly and the files are not corrupted. Why won't this new and fresh installation of Firefox properly open these files?
الحل المُختار
I have no idea what is going wrong. I presume you are following the suggestions in
- Restore bookmarks from backup or move them to another computer
- Export Firefox bookmarks to an HTML file to back up or transfer bookmarks
There is a third method of transferring bookmarks which may be better and may work. Are you able to back up the profile that is on the old machine, and then transfer that profile to the new machine.
Make copy of the file places.sqlite from the old profile and use that to overwrite the equivalent file in the new computer's profile.
If that fails then fallback to using the bookmarks backups that Firefox creates. Unfortunately you will lose History with this method. With Firefox closed delete the new machines places.sqlite (& any places.sqlite.wal or places.sqlite.shm) Now delete the new mchine's folder and its file contents bookmarkbackups before copying over a copy of the old machine's bookmarkbackups folder, plus contents. When you restart Firefox it should recreate a new database using the latest backup. The latest backup will be the copy file from the old machine.
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الحل المُختار
I have no idea what is going wrong. I presume you are following the suggestions in
- Restore bookmarks from backup or move them to another computer
- Export Firefox bookmarks to an HTML file to back up or transfer bookmarks
There is a third method of transferring bookmarks which may be better and may work. Are you able to back up the profile that is on the old machine, and then transfer that profile to the new machine.
Make copy of the file places.sqlite from the old profile and use that to overwrite the equivalent file in the new computer's profile.
If that fails then fallback to using the bookmarks backups that Firefox creates. Unfortunately you will lose History with this method. With Firefox closed delete the new machines places.sqlite (& any places.sqlite.wal or places.sqlite.shm) Now delete the new mchine's folder and its file contents bookmarkbackups before copying over a copy of the old machine's bookmarkbackups folder, plus contents. When you restart Firefox it should recreate a new database using the latest backup. The latest backup will be the copy file from the old machine.
Using your third method, and by completely replacing the profile file, I got everything to update on the new machine. It is still strange that I could not import or restore by the usual methods. I will mark this solved, though I believe problems still exist...