This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

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.

All my bookmarks lost their URLs. Then trying to restore from backup failed with "unable to process the backup file". This is Firefox 10 beta channel. Anyone have a solution?

  • 3 replies
  • 7 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by SteveMiall

SteveMiall
SteveMiall
more options

At first, the bookmark list included all my bookmarks, but they had an empty box for their icon, and clicking on the properties window showed no name or URL. Clicking on the bookmark itself was just ignored. I went to restore bookmarks from a backup - backups are listed for each day, but choosing any one gives an error. This has also wiped out the list of bookmarks.

At first, the bookmark list included all my bookmarks, but they had an empty box for their icon, and clicking on the properties window showed no name or URL. Clicking on the bookmark itself was just ignored. I went to restore bookmarks from a backup - backups are listed for each day, but choosing any one gives an error. This has also wiped out the list of bookmarks.

Chosen solution

A possible cause is a problem with the file places.sqlite that stores the bookmarks and the history.

Read this answer in context 👍 1

All Replies (3)

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
more options

Chosen Solution

A possible cause is a problem with the file places.sqlite that stores the bookmarks and the history.

John99
John99
more options

There may now not be much that can be done. Immediately find your current profile the easiest way of doing that is using

  • Help -> Troubleshooting -> Profile [open containing folder]

Copy the whole profile folder with all sub files and folders and put it somewhere safe, outside Firefox program or Profile paths (Windows desktop is a suitable location)

Once you have done that it is also worth exporting any bookmarks you have as a backup, do it as firefox backup, and HTML, it is just possible they may contain usefull info in an easily accessble form.

If the bookmarks were somehow corrupted, and then you have overwritten current bookmarks with corrupt backups there may not be much that can be done,but if you copy the profile as I mentioned above at least we still have the files and can see if anything is rescueable. There is also a possibility the files are okand the fault is with firefox,but that may be less likely.

SteveMiall
SteveMiall Question owner
more options

Thanks for your help, guys. It turned out a couple of places.sqlite.corrupt files existed and just by renaming one of them could be used again. Turned out to be a full year old, so I've lost all my recent bookmarks, but better than nothing.

Thanks for your advice on backups too, John.

Best regards, Steve