# Firefox is Banned from My Computer



## JohnHindmarsh (Jun 3, 2011)

Years ago I would carefully back up or copy relatively important "stuff" on my computer. In recent years I admit I have been a touch blasé about the need for more general stuff. [My writing files go to Dropbox]. So this week I applied the latest Firefox upgrade. It destroyed itself and for some reason impacted Scrivener and Calibre as well.

I attempted to apply fixes suggested by the Mozilla web site - in the end the message was 'Ooops - I've lost all your bookmarks."

The final fix was - uninstall Firefox - and thankfully Scrivener and Calibre came back OK. I decided I'm not risking a re-install of Firefox.

So I lost all the marketing and technical items I had bookmarked over the last six months or so, a lot of which were links garnered from KBOARDS. Ouch and moan. 

Evernote will be utilized a lot more in future.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

Firefox users, the lesson here is to back up your profile and never, ever let any piece of software auto-upgrade until you've checked the troubleshooting forums for kersplosions.


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## JRTomlin (Jan 18, 2011)

I have hated the past few Firefox 'upgrades' that I have stopped using it. It reminds me of the way Netscape went.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

Firefox is Netscape, so your impressions are spot on.


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## Cherise (May 13, 2012)

To clarify, Firefox and Netscape Navigator are both Mozilla.


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

Yeah, but the alternative is chrome, which looks and acts like an iPad couldn't reach the toilet on time after eating at Al's Uncooked Chicken Emporium.

Dear designers: No More Tiled Interfaces.


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## JohnHindmarsh (Jun 3, 2011)

Vaalingrade said:


> Firefox users, the lesson here is to back up your profile and never, ever let any piece of software auto-upgrade until you've checked the troubleshooting forums for kersplosions.


Agreed!!


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## unkownwriter (Jun 22, 2011)

I just recently went back to Firefox after using Pale Moon for years. It got to the point that PM was sending updates at least once a day, and my computer was acting funny. 

So far Firefox has been doing fine; I'm going to stick with it for now. I don't think my old PC will run anything else, and I've been warned about Chrome! LOL


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

My thing about Chrome is... it's Firefox. It's clearly and obviously Firefox... with about a billion completely unnecessary scripts running all the time and all the buttons are hidden for no reason.

Maybe it's because I'm used to Firefox, maybe it's because I was never enamored with the Apple-style HIDE EVERYTHING aesthetic, but every time I use it, I feel like I did something wrong and crewed up a Firefox install.


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## CoraBuhlert (Aug 7, 2011)

I'm still pissed off with Firefox for killing off my weather report plug-in during the last update.


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## von19 (Feb 20, 2013)

Even if FF personally deleted everything on my comp I would still use it. I cant fathom using any other browser.

Sent from The International Space Station using Tapatalk


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## That Author (Nov 17, 2013)

Vaalingrade said:


> My thing about Chrome is... it's Firefox. It's clearly and obviously Firefox... with about a billion completely unnecessary scripts running all the time and all the buttons are hidden for no reason.


They're definitely very similar now, but you've got it backwards. Firefox has slowly been moving towards a more minimalist design, which is what Chrome has been ever since it first came out. Not sure what you're referring to with the billion unnecessary scripts? The processes you see in task manager? Those are actually a feature.

But for the OP, I know Chrome (and I think FF too?) has a feature where they will back up your bookmarks (along with all your other data) on their servers. So you'll never lose that stuff again. At least not next time.


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## Gator (Sep 28, 2012)

JohnHindmarsh said:


> I attempted to apply fixes suggested by the Mozilla web site - in the end the message was 'Ooops - I've lost all your bookmarks."
> ...
> So I lost all the marketing and technical items I had bookmarked over the last six months or so, a lot of which were links garnered from KBOARDS.


Sorry this happened to you. We all have to get into the habit of frequent backups (in multiple places) if we don't want Murphy's Law to wipe out our data.

For future reference, you can bookmark your favorite KBoards threads with the horizontal menu near the top of the page ("ADD BOOKMARK"). And Firefox allows you to backup and import your bookmarks to a JSON or HTML file, too. Easy and quick to restore from the backup or even hop onto another computer with all your bookmarks intact.


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## Lummox JR (Jul 1, 2012)

I switched to Pale Moon a few weeks ago. Mozilla's UX team has been on a crusade for years now to make every stupid decision they possibly could, regardless of user feedback. Once Firefox 29 made the horrendous Australis interface official, I bailed. With Pale Moon I can use all the same plugins (and got to stop using a couple!) and everything works the same, except faster.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

Dropped Firefox years ago in favour of Chrome. Like someone else said, it's probably the same thing under the hood, but I like it. I use Dolphin on my Nexus tablet though. Chrome sucks on Android


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## Jeroen Steenbeeke (Feb 3, 2012)

Mark E. Cooper said:


> Dropped Firefox years ago in favour of Chrome. Like someone else said, it's probably the same thing under the hood, but I like it. I use Dolphin on my Nexus tablet though. Chrome sucks on Android


They're most certainly different under the hood.

Firefox runs on a rendering engine called Gecko
Chrome runs on a rendering engine called Blink, which is an offshoot of Webkit

(And in case you're interested, Internet Explorer runs on something called Trident, Opera also uses Blink, Safari uses Webkit)


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## CraigInOregon (Aug 6, 2010)

JohnHindmarsh said:


> Years ago I would carefully back up or copy relatively important "stuff" on my computer. In recent years I admit I have been a touch blase about the need for more general stuff. [My writing files go to Dropbox]. So this week I applied the latest Firefox upgrade. It destroyed itself and for some reason impacted Scrivener and Calibre as well.
> 
> I attempted to apply fixes suggested by the Mozilla web site - in the end the message was 'Ooops - I've lost all your bookmarks."
> 
> ...


I was never an IE user, and have been off Firefox for several years now, too.

Google Chrome is where it's at.

That said and aside: Did you save internet clippings and shortcuts into research folders in Scrivener? Using Firefox as your browser when you made them?

If so, that *might* have something to do with why Scrivener was affected.

Which isn't to suggest only Firefox is subject to such a disaster.

I'm sure if some upgrade destroyed bookmarks and such in IE or even *shudder* my beloved Chrome browser... basically, whichever one you have set up as your default browser... there's a slight risk of that destruction carrying over into programs that are web-dependent.

Which is largely why I use Chrome... feels the safest to me, at least for now. If something better comes along, that default web browser thing is open to revision.


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## CraigInOregon (Aug 6, 2010)

Mark E. Cooper said:


> Chrome sucks on Android


Not for me, esp. in the last several months.

It's way better than the generic browser found in Android, at any rate. I only use Chrome on my Nexus 7 and my Android phone and since both are running KitKat, Chrome is running just fine on them.

Early versions of Chrome for Android, say around the time of Gingerbread and Honeycomb, did stink.

But from Jellybean on? Smooth sailing....


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

CraigInOregon said:


> Not for me, esp. in the last several months.
> 
> It's way better than the generic browser found in Android, at any rate. I only use Chrome on my Nexus 7 and my Android phone and since both are running KitKat, Chrome is running just fine on them.
> 
> ...


But...but... chrome has horrible bookmark handling on Android compared with desktop, which is awesome. My Nexus uses the new os


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## CraigInOregon (Aug 6, 2010)

Mark E. Cooper said:


> But...but... chrome has horrible bookmark handling on Android compared with desktop, which is awesome. My Nexus uses the new os


Really?

My mileage varies there; on my Nexus, I can access all my Chrome bookmarks from my desktop install of Chrome, whether my main PC is on or off. And what I browse on my Nexus or Android phone installs of Chrome, I can revisit on my desktop because the history goes back-n-forth between all three devices.

So even if I don't bookmark something, I can get to a page I looked at on my desktop via Chrome on my Nexus or Chrome on my LG G2 phone.

It's kinda ingenious the way they've brought it all together since KitKat launched last fall.

But that's Google's style: updating frequently, expanding and improving things major and minor frequently.

That's part of why I want a Chromebook so badly; they're even more frequent with updates there.

But hey, that's just my experience. Other people may be experiencing more issues than me.


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## Mark E. Cooper (May 29, 2011)

CraigInOregon said:


> Really?
> 
> My mileage varies there; on my Nexus, I can access all my Chrome bookmarks from my desktop install of Chrome, whether my main PC is on or off. And what I browse on my Nexus or Android phone installs of Chrome, I can revisit on my desktop because the history goes back-n-forth between the two.
> 
> ...


Access yes, but usability is what I mean. I'm typing this now on my nexus in dolphin browser. A swipe with my finger atthe left edge towards the right displays a list of bookmarks. The last time iI tried chrome you had to hit a button, it replaces the entire display with folders. You open a folder hoping to find the right bookmark. Fail. Close the folderopen another one...

I want swipe and one touch without losing my window.


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## Nicole Simon (May 16, 2014)

Firefox should or cannot really inflict harm on calibre or scrivener. This is more of a sign of another problem and I would do a malware / virus check, just in case.

Even a normal deinstall of Firefox should still leave you with your bookmarks in your profile folder in your user directory - depending on your OS, you can just search for _bookmark.*_ (not sure if html or htm). As you probably only used one profile, there should only be one. It is a normal html file which can be imported into the new version (your browser should offer that).

Both firefox and chrome offer exactly for this case syncing of your settings to the cloud as well.
If you work with local bookmarks, that should be part of your backup routine.

you do have a backup routine, right?


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## CraigInOregon (Aug 6, 2010)

Mark E. Cooper said:


> Access yes, but usability is what I mean. I'm typing this now on my nexus in dolphin browser. A swipe with my finger atthe left edge towards the right displays a list of bookmarks. The last time iI tried chrome you had to hit a button, it replaces the entire display with folders. You open a folder hoping to find the right bookmark. Fail. Close the folderopen another one...
> 
> I want swipe and one touch without losing my window.


Sounds like a personal use preference to me, not a fail on the part of Chrome.

To each their own!


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

I use Firefox all the time, in part because I like the web developer tools/plug-ins I use with it (mainly "Firebug" and "Web Developer" add-ons). The other two reasons are (1) inertia and (2) it's not M$ IE.

When the latest major FF release came out with the new GUI design, within a few hours of updating I had installed the "Classic Theme Restorer" add-on, so that I could make it more or less look/act like it did before the update. But then I also run Windows 7 using the XP visual theme, so that may give you some idea how I feel about changes to user interfaces. 

In any case, the latest FF is running fine on my work computer and both of my personal computers with no ill effects -- albeit I don't use Calibre on any of them (though some version of it is installed on both my home PCs).


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## Vaalingrade (Feb 19, 2013)

CoraBuhlert said:


> I'm still p*ssed off with Firefox for killing off my weather report plug-in during the last update.


Thank you! That, plus the stupid UI changes caused me to loose a couple of hours of productivity fixing what wasn't broken. I hate how software/site designers just screw with interfaces and leave longtime users in the lurch.


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## Mike D. aka jmiked (Oct 28, 2008)

About very three or four months, I manage to get ticked off at whatever browser I'm using on my Mac laptop or Windows desktop computers (they all have significant disadvantages to me). Then I switch to another one. I seem to alternate between Firefox, Safari, and Chrome, and sometimes Opera.

I keep my bookmarks automatically synced between all those browsers (except Opera) with Xmarks, so that no matter which one I start using after the latest outrage, my bookmarks are all in sync, even between my Mac and my Windows machine (and to a lesser extent, my Android phone).

Mike


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## geoffthomas (Feb 27, 2009)

I have enjoyed the use of Firefox since I switched from IE a long time ago.
I feel no desire to switch to Chrome or anything else.
I do think it would be interesting to know what platform those who are complaining are running on.
Like NogDog, I am running on Windows 7.  I sense that many of you are talking about an Android phone (nexus) or tablet implementation (?).


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## CraigInOregon (Aug 6, 2010)

Windows  7 on my desktop and laptop. Android KitKat on my LG G2 phone and my Nexus 7 tablet. 

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk


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## Chad Winters (Oct 28, 2008)

I like Chrome because between home, work and games, I use a lot of different platforms Windows 7, 8, Linux, iOS and Macs. With Chrome I set them all up to run similar to a Chromebook where most of my programs and data are Chrome based and accessible no matter which device I am using.

As Knightwise would say I'm a cross platform slider..... http://knightwise.com/kw804-the-cross-platform-startup/


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## Tony Richards (Jul 6, 2011)

I use Chrome on my laptop -- I work exclusively from home, so have no need of anything smaller -- and it suits me just fine, including the bookmarks.


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## *DrDLN* (dr.s.dhillon) (Jan 19, 2011)

My worst experience is built in IE with Window 8. I can't use or update that Microsoft IE. So I have to use Firefox unless I can have something better....


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## NogDog (May 1, 2009)

*DrDLN* (dr.s.dhillon) said:


> My worst experience is built in IE with Window 8. I can't use or update that Microsoft IE. So I have to use Firefox unless I can have something better....


Using any browser other than IE is one security precaution any Windows user can take.


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