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Recover Lost Tabs

  • 2 replies
  • 3 have this problem
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  • Last reply by alan_r

I was actually trying to reopen a recently closed tab by right clicking any open tab and selecting "Undo Close Tab", however I accidentally hit the "Close Other Tab". I did of course immediately do a proper "Undo Close Tab", however this was only able to bring back a few tabs; where as I originally had easily 20+ tabs open (I'm a very busy web surfer). I've now lost it all, everything from university research links to my google searches on the German court system.

is there a way to revert back to a previous point? or to disable the "Close Other Tab" & "Close Tab to the Right" options so this doesn't happen again? I never use them anyway they course more difficulty

I was actually trying to reopen a recently closed tab by right clicking any open tab and selecting "Undo Close Tab", however I accidentally hit the "Close Other Tab". I did of course immediately do a proper "Undo Close Tab", however this was only able to bring back a few tabs; where as I originally had easily 20+ tabs open (I'm a very busy web surfer). I've now lost it all, everything from university research links to my google searches on the German court system. is there a way to revert back to a previous point? or to disable the "Close Other Tab" & "Close Tab to the Right" options so this doesn't happen again? I never use them anyway they course more difficulty

All Replies (2)

If you haven't closed Firefox yet then do not close Firefox.

Backup the session files in the sessionstore-backups folder in the Firefox Profile Folder to make sure not to lose possible important session data.

You can use this button to go to the current Firefox profile folder if Firefox is still open:

  • Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder (Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder)

If Firefox is closed then go to the profile folder directly.

"AppData" (XP: Application Data; Mac: ~/Library; Linux: ~/.mozilla) is a hidden folder.

You can find these files in the sessionstore-backups folder:

previous.js (cleanBackup: copy of sessionstore.js from previous session that was loaded successfully)
recovery.js (latest version of the sessionstore written during runtime)
recovery.bak (previous version of the sessionstore written during runtime)
upgrade.js-<build_id> (backup created during an upgrade of Firefox)

You can copy a file from the sessionstore-backups folder to the main profile and rename the file to sessionstore.js to replace the current file (make a backup copy of the current sessionstore.js).

See also: http://www.ghacks.net/2014/06/27/mozilla-launches-improved-session-restore-firefox-33/

Is there a reason why you can't reconstruct your tabs from History e.g. Privacy Mode or Setting to delete history on Firefox close?