os x Cannot import bookmarks
I have sad enough of Safari on my macs and have started to use Firefox. I am trying to import bookmarks from safari, have followed the instructions and yet end up with no bookmarks imported. I have exported the bookmarks from Safari and saved in a file called bookmarks.html as instructed. I then went to Bookmarks / Library / import bookmarks from html, selected the file, clicked open and nothing happens.
Any help would be appreciated.
Wšykne wótegrona (11)
Please try opening the bookmarks.html file in the Firefox browser to ensure that the bookmarks have been exported from Safari correctly. When you open the file in the Firefox browser, it should be a web page with a bunch of links.
If the page appears blank, please try exporting the bookmarks from Safari again.
Also, please ensure that the bookmarks have not been added to the Unsorted Bookmarks folder in Firefox. Please check all bookmarks folders for your imported bookmarks.
The bookmarks file exported from Safari does contain the bookmarks shown as links. My Bookmarks library is completely empty. When I click on the Unsorted bookmarks with the Bookmarks Library window opened, nothing happens nor does anything show in the Library windows. I think this is a deeper problem than something I am doing wrong. The home page is set to Google. When I open up, if I type something in the search box and click search, the box just clears itself. To go a Google search I have to go to the Google web site and do a search from there. No matter how many times I click the button to bookmark a page I am viewing, nothing happens.
You can check for problems with the places.sqlite database file (bookmarks, history) in the Firefox profile folder.
- Places Maintenance: https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/places-maintenance/
- 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
You can check if there are FOLDED attributes in the HTML file.
- [/questions/932927] Firefox 14.01 not importing html bookmarks
You can open the HTML file in TextEdit and remove all FOLDED attributes in the H3 tags (leave the H3 tags).
- <DT><H3 FOLDED>Bookmarks Bar</H3> -> <DT><H3>Bookmarks Bar</H3>
I opened the downloaded html file of book marks in Textedit and it long exactly the same as if I had opened it in Safari - a long list of links with no HTML. Even without this problem it does not solve why I cannot create new bookmarks in Firefox, why it will not remember which web sites I have visited, and logs me out of sites after each visit even though I have asked to stay logged in.
Much more to the point, this is a freshly downloaded programme of the latest version loaded on to a brand new imac fresh out of the box yesterday. If you have to go through hoops to try to sort out multiple problems in those circumstances then there is something sadly wrong with it.
Wót Boltonjohn změnjony
Is the latest version broken at source? You cannot get a cleaner situation than a machine which is less than a week old, deleting everything to do with old versions and downloading the latest version - but it doesn't work. And all the tips in the world about opening this, and unlocking that file and trying this are a complete waste of time if the programme does not work out of the box. I must have spent two or three hours trying to fix this. I would rather have paid £100 for a programme with the same features which actually works. Safari is now a download-gobbler, and Firefox does not work as it should. Boltonjohn said
The bookmarks file exported from Safari does contain the bookmarks shown as links. My Bookmarks library is completely empty. When I click on the Unsorted bookmarks with the Bookmarks Library window opened, nothing happens nor does anything show in the Library windows. I think this is a deeper problem than something I am doing wrong. The home page is set to Google. When I open up, if I type something in the search box and click search, the box just clears itself. To go a Google search I have to go to the Google web site and do a search from there. No matter how many times I click the button to bookmark a page I am viewing, nothing happens.
Did you both the Bookmarks Menu folder and the Unsorted folder in the Bookmarks Manager (Library) to see if they might have imported to one of these?
Dos an automatically created compressed .jsonlz4 backup show an item count greater than zero in its name?
- bookmarks-YYYY-MM-DD_<item-count>_<hash>.jsonlz4
The Bookmarks menu folder and the library are completely empty, zero, zilch.
You miss the point of my last post. If a new installed download needs anybody to start looking at compressed files to get it working, or to start looking if files are write-protected when they shouldn't be then it is just not fit for purpose. If it doesn't work from a fresh download of the latest version onto a brand new computer then the new version should not have been released. I know it is free but the working time spent trying to sort this out means I would much rather have paid for a working programme. I do not know how the counts work at the top of a post but there is either one or two other people with the same problem so I am not alone.
You will only lose the bookmarks completely if a new profile got created, possibly because of issues with the profiles.ini file. Security software can cause issues with updating n case some file are locked.
Are there any backups available to restore if you check that in the Bookmarks Manager (Library)?
- Bookmarks > Show All Bookmarks > Import & Backup (third button on the toolbar)
I have never had bookmarks because I never used Firefox as my main browser so I have lost nothing. I just cannot get the newly downloaded version to create new bookmarks or to import them from Safari.
If you can't create a new bookmark, either by clicking the star on the Navigation Toolbar or via the right-click context menu on the browser page or otherwise then there is likely a problem with the places.sqlite file like I posted above.
If the Places Maintenance extension can't repair the places.sqlite database file then remove all places.sqlite file(s) in the Firefox profile folder to make Firefox rebuild the places.sqlite database file from the most recent JSON backup in the bookmarkbackups folder.
This is not going in is it. You get a brand new car, drive it home and it breaks down, you ring the garage and the guy on the phone tells you to open the bonnet and he will tell you what to do to try and fix. And you would say what exactly to him? I know it is a free download but the circumstances I have described - brand new machine, brand new download there is a strong possibility that the problem is already in what is being downloaded. Has anybody else downloaded 40.0.3 onto an imac running Yosemite 10.10.4 and did they have a similar problem? That would indicate whether the download is creating a problem on my new machine or whether the bug is being downloaded.