Restoring JSON favorite file in FF does not show favorites
I got a new computer and am trying to copy over my bookmarks via the JSON file I took from my old tower. When I got to "restore" the JSON into my new computer, the bookmarks do not show up anywhere in FF. I've tried this with two versions of FF - 17 and 3.6 but both times, the JSON file was not transferred or restored into the version of FF.
I have 10 JSON files ranging in dates and none of them will allow me to restore. There is no prompt that pops up telling me that the JSON was or was not restored - but nothing shows.
I've also tried copying over the places.sqlite file that went along with those book marks.
Currently I have the old hard drive hooked up to my new computer. I even deleted all traces of FF on the new hard drive, went into the old hard drive (again that should have? all the bookmarks i want) and went into program files to load up FF hoping to get all my bookmarks but for some reason when I do this, the latest version of FF loads up (even though on the old hard drive I was using a much much older version of FF) and without my bookmarks
Please - any ideas on this would be much appreciated!!!
All Replies (11)
Firefox doesn't store data like bookmarks in the program files folder, that data is located in the Profile folder.
http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Recovering+important+data+from+an+old+profile
Your Profile is located here in Vista & Win7:
drive:\Users\Windows login user name\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\profile_name
yes i understand that about vista/7
let me re-phrase my post to tell what i have and what i want:
i have a harddrive with winXP loaded on it from a computer where the motherboard fried that has FF loaded onto with a lot of bookmarks that i want
i have a newer computer that has vista loaded onto it
i have my winXP harddrive connected to my new vista computer
how can i get my bookmarks transferred from the winXP drive to the vista computer? (my first post is what i have tried to do so far)
Make sure that the files have a .json file extension.
A JSON backup starts with: {"title":"","id":1,"dateAdded":
You can verify that in the Properties via the right-click context menu.
Are you using this menu item?
- Bookmarks > Show All Bookmarks > Import & Backup > Restore > Choose File
You can also check for problems with the places.sqlite database file in the Firefox Profile Folder.
yes i am using .JSON files
yes ive tried to restore the bookmarks the way you called out
and i also replaced the places.sqlite file with the one that was associated with the FF from where i want to get the bookmarks from
any ideas of things i can try here????
Are you sure that you copied the places.sqlite file to the correct folder?
Be sure to do this with Firefox closed and also remove any other places files in that folder.
You can use this button to go to the Firefox profile folder:
- Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder
ok so i am reopening this up again as i have not be able to resolve this issue. see the linked image below for the files/location i am getting my bookmarks form - when i open them in FF, my bookmarks arent there
any thoughts?
4 KB is the size of a bookmark backups JSON file for the default bookmarks which come with Firefox, which is the file size of everyone of those backup files. I doubt if that Profile was the one you were using on the older installation. Do you have any other Profiles in the Profile folder?
Those are backups from the first 7 months of last year (2012) as you can see by the name and modification date, so they won't have any recent bookmarks even if they would be large enough to store them (which is most likely not the case with a file size of 4 KB as posted above).
You can see in the compatibility.ini file in the main profile folder by which Firefox version this profile has been used last.
as written in my original post - the bookmarks im trying to locate were from a computer...that died...7 months ago so the dates are what they should be
ok the 4kb comment is very useful - this is what im looking for. so if those JSON files are not what i should be looking at where should i be looking? im so confused - and no there are no other profiles listed - only the one shown in the picture
i also did a search for "bookmarks" on that harddrive and the only JSON files that came up were the 10 that are shown. so like i said - i have the whole harddrive that had FF loaded onto it with the bookmarks i want but i just need to know where to look for them and those JSON files dont work (and yes you are right, they load up the stock FF bookmarks)
One thing that doesn't look right to me is that those backup files are spread out over 6 months, where Firefox creates a backup every time it is used (when it is closed by the user), and it saves the last 10 days worth of backups before overwriting the oldest saved backup file.
Is it possible that you only used Firefox on that PC 10 times between 1.30.2012 and 7.13.2012?
Is there any chance that you had been using Firefox in a different Windows Logon User Account?
A 2nd LUA would have a completely separate App Data folder and thus a separate Mozilla / Firefox / Profile folder and Profile.
hmmm interesting
Just went through the harddrive looking at app data for admin/ccolagio/default...and the only "user" that had a mozilla folder was ccolagio which was my one and only login that i used - and i am the only user of this computer
i def used FF on that PC more than 10 times in those months. FF had years and years of bookmarks on it so i would use it daily
thanks for everyones continued support/interest in this - this is the last thing before i can fully "move into" my new computer!