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

Different sized bookmark-backup files, WHY?

  • 3 svar
  • 2 har dette problemet
  • 1 view
  • Siste svar av cor-el

more options

So I am trying to transfer my Firefox 53 bookmarks from one PC (Windows 10) to another (Ubuntu 17.04) via the "json" Filetype. The first problem was that the Restoring from file always produced a error message of a script not working (disabling addons/plugins, aswell as giving the script more time by changing the config value from 10 to 20 did not help), I clicked "continue" and it seemed to finish correctly.

To check whether the Transfer was corrupted by the script error, I made a backup file (again .json) of the new installation.

Problem: The original Backup File was 2,5MB big, the "test-backup" is 2,4MB big!!!

I thought maybe Ubuntu is the problem, so I made a fresh installation of Windows 10+Firefox on another partition. With this Win10 installation i had no script-error during bookmarks-installation.

BUT: A test-backup of this third installation was only 2,3MB big!

So my bookmark backups keep getting smaller eventhough they should have identical contents!

Where is the fault?

So I am trying to transfer my Firefox 53 bookmarks from one PC (Windows 10) to another (Ubuntu 17.04) via the "json" Filetype. The first problem was that the Restoring from file always produced a error message of a script not working (disabling addons/plugins, aswell as giving the script more time by changing the config value from 10 to 20 did not help), I clicked "continue" and it seemed to finish correctly. To check whether the Transfer was corrupted by the script error, I made a backup file (again .json) of the new installation. Problem: The original Backup File was 2,5MB big, the "test-backup" is 2,4MB big!!! I thought maybe Ubuntu is the problem, so I made a fresh installation of Windows 10+Firefox on another partition. With this Win10 installation i had no script-error during bookmarks-installation. BUT: A test-backup of this third installation was only 2,3MB big! So my bookmark backups keep getting smaller eventhough they should have identical contents! Where is the fault?

All Replies (3)

more options

Hello,

To transfer bookmarks the Export / Inport options available in the Library can be used. To open the Library click either the history or bookmarks toolbar button and show all history / bookmarks.

more options

Thats not helpful at all.

Have you even read my post?

more options

There is probably some meta data in the file (last modified, last visited) that could account for this. Firefox could remove/reset some of this meta data that prevents this data from getting included if you make a new backup. You would have to compare the two files.

You can use the Scratchpad to inspect the file.

  • "3-bar" menu button or Tools -> Web Developer
  • click the "Pretty Print" button to format the file for readability.

Firefox also comes with a built-in JSON viewer (devtools.jsonview.enabled).