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How do I restore lost tabs

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

LikeFF
LikeFF
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I just closed down all applications cleanly, including Firefox, and then did a Microsoft update. Firefox was in a a strange and very bad state when I restarted it after the update.

  1. Two of my three Firefox windows started up just fine, including all of their tabs -- that's the good news
  2. The Firefox window I was last working in, though, has MAJOR problems
  3. For the tab group that was active: It has a tab for each tab I had open when I closed Firefox, BUT all of the tabs are new tabs
  4. For all other tab groups: all of my tab groups exist, but all of them are empty -- no tabs of any kind

<rant on> Firefox has had tab loss problems for years, but I have never seen any this severe, and I have never seen any I could not recover from using the backup files. This is completely inexcusable -- losing user data is one of the most severe bugs a program can have, and Firefox has had variations of this problem for years. That has GOT to get fixed, once and for all ! <rant off>

QUESTION: how can I recover my missing tabs?

Edited to remove the leading line spaces which cause a catty-wampus display with this forum software and makes the message to go into overflow.

I just closed down all applications cleanly, including Firefox, and then did a Microsoft update. Firefox was in a a strange and very bad state when I restarted it after the update. # Two of my three Firefox windows started up just fine, including all of their tabs -- that's the good news # The Firefox window I was last working in, though, has MAJOR problems # For the tab group that was active: It has a tab for each tab I had open when I closed Firefox, BUT all of the tabs are new tabs # For all other tab groups: all of my tab groups exist, but all of them are empty -- no tabs of any kind <rant on> Firefox has had tab loss problems for years, but I have never seen any this severe, and I have never seen any I could not recover from using the backup files. This is completely inexcusable -- losing user data is one of the most severe bugs a program can have, and Firefox has had variations of this problem for years. That has GOT to get fixed, once and for all ! <rant off> QUESTION: how can I recover my missing tabs? ''Edited to remove the leading line spaces which cause a catty-wampus display with this forum software and makes the message to go into overflow.''

Modified by the-edmeister

All Replies (3)

Paul
Paul
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Hi

Big changes are coming to Firefox soon that will see improvements in a number of areas, but in the meantime, I recommend that you have a read of this article that should help with this issue.

I hope that this helps, but if not, please come back here and we can look into a different solution for you.

LikeFF
LikeFF Question owner
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I tried all files in the folder and nothing worked. Nothing had any tabs saved.

The page referred to mentions "sessions with lots of tabs" -- what constitutes "lots of tabs"? I had several tab groups, total number of tabs in the high double digits. That is the way I save state for things I cannot deal with at the moment, but want to get back to later. Loss of that state is a serous problem for me.

I cannot stress strongly enough my opinion that it is inexcusable to have this Severity 1 bug continue to exist for a long time -- years -- now. I have been a loyal Firefox user since not long after its inception. The continued existence of the Severity 1 bug is making me wonder whether it may be past time to reconsider which browser to use, though.

To be honest, I really cannot comprehend how Firefox could lose my tabs state when I shut it down cleanly. It should not ever lose that state, but after a clean shutdown????

LikeFF
LikeFF Question owner
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By the way, I have been using the "Tab Groups" extension. I see the author says it is going away later this year, due to irreconcilable differences between him and Mozilla.

What is the best tabs & tab groups software that will continue to be supported? Since I need to recreate as much of the lost information as I can, I may as well also migrate to software that will continue to work.

Thanks