Migrating Profiles

Since I do extensive testing with multiple builds of Firefox, I have several profiles. The biggest hassle when creating a new profile is you start with a clean slate.  That is you start with no bookmarks, extensions, themes, saved passwords or form history, permissions, browser history, etc. However most of this information can easily be migrated to another profile if you know what files you need. Simply copy the files below from the folder of your main profile to that of the new profile(s):

• Bookmarks: bookmarks.html
• Browser History: history.dat
• Passwords: singson.txt and key3.db
• Saved Forms: formhistory.dat
• Site Permissions: hostperm.1

While it is possible to move your userChrome.css, userConent.css, user.js and prefs.js files to the new profile it is strongly recommended you DO NOT do this. Problems with corrupted, damaged, malfunctioning and/or misbehaving profiles are usually caused by one or more of these four files. Moving these files over to a new profile is going bring the same problems to your new profile.

You will still need to reinstall your extensions and themes but at least you will have everything else migrated over fairly quickly and painlessly. For more information about migrating profiles see link below.

Information Source: mozillaZine Knowledge Base ~ Migrating Profiles

Improper Shutdown Bug

I was looking through the mozillaZine Firefox Bugs forum last night and came across a thread titled Improper shutdown of Firefox when shutting down computer. Turns out this is related to Bug 333907 and appear to have become more of an issue in Firefox 2 builds with Windows XP (although I thought I saw Mac mentioned in Bug 342885). Instead of closing Firefox before shutting down Windows, users are letting Windows close all the programs as it shuts down. Even with this method, Firefox is still closing normally, that is to say users are not getting the Unresponsive Program dialog box. However Firefox on the other hand, is treating this type of shut down as if it was not properly shut down and displays this warning when relaunched. This should be fixed with the 2.0.0.2 build, but in the mean time there are couple ways to fix this via about:config:

• Add a NEW Boolean pref called: browser.sessionstore.resume_from_crash and set it to false

OR

• Add a NEW String pref called: browser.sessionstore.restore_prompt_uri and set it to javascript:window.close();

Now, since I use the session restore to have Firefox start off where I left off (Show my windows and tabs from last time) I wasn’t sure what would happen if I made any of these above changes. One thing to keep in mind, I normally close all my applications before close Windows. Since Firefox was eating up a lot of memory and I had rebooted in a while I went ahead and restarted Windows without first closing anything. After Windows finished booting and I restarted Firefox I got the warning dialog.

So in a new profile I ran a little experiment just to see what would happen. First, I made sure in my Options… I had ‘When Firefox starts’ set to ‘Show my windows and tabs from last time’. Next I added the string from the second tip, I also had several tabs open then with Firefox (and everything else still open), I went ahead and shut down Windows again (I later discovered ‘Log Off’ would also produce the same “crash” effect). After the reboot, I relaunched Firefox (with the testing profile) and it behaved as if I had shut it down prior to exiting Windows.

Now, if you are not using the session restore feature, the first option would be fine for your use. Just keep in mind doing this will completely disable the session restore upon a “crash” or Windows forced shut-down. If you do use the session restore, stick to second option. Further you should only use one of these fixes since option #1 completely disables the session restore there is no need to auto-close the dialog box.

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