Reload past Firefox profile
Several weeks ago, I was attempting to upgrade from Windows 10 to Windows 11. In the process, I deleted Firefox (using Revo Uninstaller) and then reinstalled it, downloading it from the Mozilla website. Unfortunately, it didn’t run, giving me, at different attempts, different error messages. In the time since then, I have read many suggestions from many different websites and I have tried some of these suggestions, all with no success – until today. I have just completed the suggestions made on https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1327628 and Firefox is now back, working. I am happy and grateful, but not finished. None of my personal data came with the currently functioning version of Firefox. Since the re-emergence of Firefox, I have been reading several websites dealing with copy, backup and restore of my Firefox profile. Right now, the path C:\Users\rsuth\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ shows 5 folders: Two of the folders show 11/11/24 as the date modified (probably the date of the download from Mozilla). The folder 0dppjrfa.default contains one file, times.json, dated 8/11/2020. The other folder, ru82tlj5.default-release, has 97 items, most dated 11/11/2024. The remaining three folders are all dated 12/2/24 (today, as I write this). One folder’s name ends .default, the second name ends .default-release, and the third name ends .default-release-thirteen digits. The question that I am asking here is what do I do next to, hopefully, bring back the personal date I had with Firefox before my updating to Windows 11. Should I delete the folders dated 12/2/24? What, if anything, is the significance of the folder whose name ends in 13 digits? I’m hoping someone will be able to tell me how to fix these Firefox problems. And if I can, then I hope to be able to do something similar to help me bring back Thunderbird as well. Thunderbird became unfunctioning at the same time as Firefox. Thank you.
All Replies (1)
I_Rufus said
None of my personal data came with the currently functioning version of Firefox. Since the re-emergence of Firefox, I have been reading several websites dealing with copy, backup and restore of my Firefox profile. Right now, the path C:\Users\rsuth\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ shows 5 folders: Two of the folders show 11/11/24 as the date modified (probably the date of the download from Mozilla). The folder 0dppjrfa.default contains one file, times.json, dated 8/11/2020. The other folder, ru82tlj5.default-release, has 97 items, most dated 11/11/2024. The remaining three folders are all dated 12/2/24 (today, as I write this). One folder’s name ends .default, the second name ends .default-release, and the third name ends .default-release-thirteen digits. The question that I am asking here is what do I do next to, hopefully, bring back the personal date I had with Firefox before my updating to Windows 11.
Generally speaking, folders ending in .default haven't been used in recent versions of Firefox; the switch to .default-release began around Firefox 67. When a profile name has a long number on the end, it was created as the result of a Refresh (the old folder would have been moved to the system desktop inside an Old Firefox Data folder).
Do you think 11/11/2024 would be a logical "last good version" date, or is that not recent enough? If you think that might be the right folder, here is what I suggest:
Profile Manager Page
Inside Firefox, type or paste about:profiles in the address bar and press Enter/Return to load it.
This page should list at least one profile and could list many. (Each profile has two folders and one or more buttons. Do not use any Remove buttons!)
Can you find the profile with ru82tlj5.default-release at the end of the "Root Directory" path? If so, you can check whether it is the one you were using recently by clicking its Launch profile in new browser button.
If it isn't what you want, simply close that new window.
If it IS what you want, back on the about:profiles page, click the Set as default profile button for that profile so Firefox uses it automatically at the next startup.
Any progress so far, or is that one missing or not the latest?
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