Firefox 128.3.1esr *not* clearing history on closing

Altoid · 2024-10-16 15:00:27

Hello:

Devuan Daedalus now running Firefox 128.3.1esr but the same thing was happening with the previous browser version.

I have (as I have done ever since I can recall) the Privacy and Security -> History setting as 'Use custom settings for history' with 'Clear history when Firefox closes' checked.

Always worked, but now I find that closing Firefox does not do what I set it to do.

I return home, boot my box, open Firefox and instead of getting the usual blank page, I get the last web site I was looking at when I closed the browser.
Quite annoying.

Has anyone else seen this same behaviour?
Any idea as to what may be going in?

Thanks in advance.

Best,

A.

quickfur · 2024-10-16 17:30:59

No idea what's going on, but if you're paranoid, you can always

rm -rf ~/.cache/mozilla/firefox

to destroy all cached files. This probably also includes profiles and settings, though, so if you want to save some things, you may need to refine that rm target appropriately.

Altoid · 2024-10-16 18:31:23

Hello:

quickfur wrote:

... you can always ...
... probably also includes profiles and settings ...

I'd rather it worked as intended.

One thing though: while testing today I found that I cannot reproduce this at will, which is strange.
I'll have to do some more testing.

Thanks for your input.

Best,

A.

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn · 2024-10-17 06:02:24

if you are comfortable using Firefox "about:config" area, then you can start investigating by searching these one at a time. "resume" "reload" "restart" and any other keywords/phrases that might show what is happening.

please keep us posted on your progress as i am sure others will have the same situation!

Altoid · 2024-10-17 14:14:38

Hello:

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn wrote:

... comfortable using Firefox "about:config" ...

Sure, no problem with that.

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn wrote:

... start investigating by searching these ...

Thanks for that info.

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn wrote:

... keep us posted ...

Of course, always.

But ...
On one hand, I have not heard from anyone (yet) with the same issue and on the other, I have not been able to reproduce it.
Not has it happened again.

What I know for sure is that I had not ever seen it happen before the last two Firefox *esr updates.
ie: the versions without the upper left hand View recent browsing across windows and devices icon.

Can that new crap feature be disabled?

And then it may be a fluke, a hardware problem or worse, allucinations. 8^°
No idea, but I don't like it.

Thanks for your input.

Best,

A.

fsmithred · 2024-10-17 15:09:29

115.8.0esr in excalibur works correctly. It has the "Firefox View" icon in the upper left.

128.3.1esr in the same excalibur also works correctly. This one has a folder icon in the upper left that says "View recent browsing..."

I tried the newer version both by closing the window and by killing firefox from a terminal. Both worked correctly.

blackhole · 2024-10-17 15:12:57

Check the bug reports:

https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/pkgrepo … t=unstable

Maybe a relevant one among that bugfest: https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugrepo … bug=682369

Still seems open and unfixed...

Altoid · 2024-10-17 20:22:12

Hello:

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn wrote:

... comfortable using Firefox "about:config" ...

That is usually, albeit not always, a good way to start.

I went looking and through trial and error finally managed to (?) domesticate the beast a bit.
But the jury is still deliberating, so caveat emptor.

What I did in about:config was this:

1. looked for all instances of recent
2. set browser.bookmarks.editDialog.maxRecentFolders to 0
3. set browser.download.manager.addToRecentDocs to false
4. set browser.engagement.recent_visited_origins.expiry to 1*
5. set browser.urlbar.recentsearches.featureGate to false
6. set browser.urlbar.suggest.recentsearches to false
7. set privacy.restrict3rdpartystorage.heuristic.recently_visited_time to 1*
8. set services.sync.prefs.sync.browser.ctrlTab.sortByRecentlyUsed to false

* the default values are (probably) in seconds so I used 1 in case nought (0) means forever.

There's probably more to edit, time will tell.

Thank you all for your input.

Best,

A.

Devarch · 2024-11-03 11:27:03

LibreWolf erases history.

Camtaf · 2024-11-03 12:01:12

I found more or less the same problem, FF won't delete recent history, but I found this to work, use Show all history - Select all - Delete

greenjeans · 2024-11-13 23:41:27

Yeah Chromium doesn't want to do it either.

It's kind of astounding the amount of temp files and cookies and other garbage that accumulates in just one day, usually 400+mb on my machine. Ridiculous, almost half a gig.

I run bleachbit at the end of the day before shutdown, it cleans that stuff up pretty good.

Babarosa · 2024-11-14 08:16:09

One possible solution is to use "bleachbit" to clean caches, cookies, ...

https://www.bleachbit.org/

Using bleachbit I never had problems with "destroying my system" by accidentally deleting files, but I make backups and am mindful when using this software :-)

Last edited by Babarosa (2024-11-14 09:31:11)

blackhole · 2024-11-14 14:33:23

I would avoid bleachbit. Totally unnecessary, Windows style, registry cleaner. If you have an SSD, constantly wiping and recreating the cache data is not a good thing.

Post #2 actually refers to removing the cache, which is counterproductive - unless you're absolutely paranoid - and won't remove the browsing history.

The file(s) you would need to remove are actually in the profile directory

The following should remove all browsing history from all profiles (or modify the below just to target your profile directory).

$ rm ~/.mozilla/firefox/*/places.sqlite

You could place this in a simple script to start firefox and run that on exit.

Last edited by blackhole (2024-11-14 14:33:44)

stopAI · 2024-11-14 16:36:05

Hello.
If a person wants to remain anonymous on the Internet (as far as it is possible on the Internet), is it not better to use Tor Browser? As far as I know this browser deletes the browsing data automatically after closing it.

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn · 2024-11-14 16:55:49

tails anyone?

https://tails.net/about/index.en.html

blackhole · 2024-11-14 18:18:34

My interpretation was that this is more a matter of removing browsing history on closing the browser - quite different from anonymity.

Tor browser does that by default because it's set to private browsing mode or not to store history at all - can't remember which, as I haven't used it in years.

stargate-sg1-cheyenne-mtn · 2024-11-14 20:16:38

yes, OP reported having firefox set to remove history when closed/shutdown/terminated and then had an occurrence where when starting firefox they were returned to the webpage they were at when firefox was previously closed/shutdown/terminated.

and further reported that it only happened once and/or infrequently.

a guess would be that firefox somehow failed to shutdown completely/gracefully/etc or that it somehow was still _running_in_the_background_ unknown to the OP.

and since we are now at firefox 128.4.0esr, hopefully it won't happen again.

fanderal · 2024-11-14 21:26:34

Using FF 128.4.0esr on Ceres

Some time ago I also found FF keeping stuff I didn't want kept. In Settings > Search > Address Bar, there's a list under "When using the address bar, suggest" Although all were unchecked, suggestions from bookmarks and sites previously visited still showed up. Didn't matter that "Delete cookies and site data when Firefox is closed" and "Clear history when Firefox closes" were checked. Bleachbit wiped any further suggestions. This FF setting works now but is the info simply hidden?

In my fluxbox menu along with a script:

xterm -e 'bleachbit --preset -c && ~/scripts/./flashcache.sh'

The script deletes mozilla's cookies.sqlite, favicons.sqlite, bookmarkbackups, cleans ~/.dbus/session-bus, /tmp files and dirs in ~/.cache. I created a waterfox.xml cleaner for bleachbit and did the same when I replaced it with librewolf.

I don't expect to remain anonymous, just keep FF and LW (if possible) from knowing everything I do. I agree about excess SSD use yet I've been running bleachbit daily on this Crucial 120GB for ~10 years.

If interested in what Bleachbit's firefox cleaner does:
https://github.com/bleachbit/bleachbit/ … irefox.xml

Also if interested, open the user.js file (bottom of list) for about:config privacy/security settings at https://github.com/arkenfox/user.js

devur · 2024-11-18 10:40:37

Haw you tried out install firejail and firecfg, not that it will solve your problem with Firefox
Ther is also this link
https://dev1galaxy.org/viewtopic.php?pid=50477#p50477

The officially official Devuan Forum!

#1 2024-10-16 15:00:27