SillyDog701

[proto57]

Here is a bizarre one for you... and I apologize if it's been posted already, but I did a search and could not find it on the forums:

I have version "Netscape 7.2 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.7.2) Gecko/20040804 Netscape/7.2 (ax)". The browser is making a new copy of my "bookmarks.html" file, numbering the copies sequentially, every 20 to 30 seconds. And it does not stop... if I leave the browser open, whether or not I am online, it will fill my hard drive until I freeze up:



I first found it when my "C" drive was full... Netscape had made over 2,300 copies of bookmarks.html, which totalled over 350MB. The copies (as you know) were in: C:Windows\Application Data\Mozilla\Profiles\noone(my registered name)\wifleici.slt\

I run Windows98SE on a P500 with 256MB RAM. Yes, old, I know. Works fine for me. I have it set so Netscape saves it's cache on another drive.

I have tried to figure out when Netscape starts doing this, because it will only save one bookmarks.html per new "tab" which I open. But then something will trigger the bizarre copying act... it might be on my fourth or fifth tab, it might be when the forth or fifth tab is opened, AND I've opened my sidebar to bookmarks... but at some point it is "triggered", and I can watch the wifleici.slt\ folder start filling up... 2 or 3 times a minute a new bookmarks.html file appears... I have to delete them every few minutes of browsing, because they quickly add up to 10's of MB. Anyone see this? Any help is appreciated. Netscape did not respond to my report... Rich.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.7.2) Gecko/20040804 Netscape/7.2 (ax)

[Alice]

http://sillydog.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7235
Bookmark problems

In the Mozilla/Profiles/default/r337bbgc.slt there are the bookmarks.html and Xbookmarks.html files and also bookmarks-1.html, bookmarks-2.html... until bookmarks-9999 (these bookmarks-1 etc all seems empty).

Delete the bookmarks-1.html, bookmarks-2.html... bookmarks-9999.html files and see if that fixes the problem.

<snip>
Related thread:
http://ufaq.org/modules.php?name=Forums ... pic&t=2978
delay on closing windows

I was browsing the slt directory to get to the XUL.mfl
file to try deleting it again when I noticed about 4000 empty files
name bookmarks-xxx.htm. I deleted the empty files and the
problem went away. Evidently, when you kill a window it does
something with all of the bookmark files it finds.

I did a bugzilla search on bookmarks-1.html and came up with a list of bugs which I had posted on the ufaq.org forum thread, including:

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=157152
read-only/hidden bookmarks.html causes creation of bookmarks-{n+1}.html

The FIRST thing I would do would be to make sure your bookmarks.html file is not "read-only" or "hidden" (look for a bookmarks.html.moztmp file and check that as well). Also make sure your "profilename"/wifleici.SLT folder is not read-only.

You can also look through the above bugzilla report and it's duplicates to see if you can find anything else helpful.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041107 Firefox/1.0

[proto57]

Alice, Alice Alice! You were right on the money, thank you so much.

My "bookmarks.html" file, and it's evil minions, actually were not "read only". But sure enough, the "bookmarks.html.moztemp" file was RO. When I unchecked the "read only" box under it's properties, the problem went away. Interestingly, the "bookmarks.html.moztemp" file also went away... I guess it's not needed after the change.

So to test it I opened 5 tabs in Netscape, opened "my sidebar" to bookmarks, used some bookmarks, "managed" my bookmarks by moving and deleting some stuff... somewhere in there the bug would have started going lemmings, or bunnies or whatever. But the problem is all gone... just some well behaved bookmarks.html's... up to number 5 (the number of tabs I had opened, perhaps?), are sitting patiently in the folder.

So thanks so much for your expertise, and time.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.7.2) Gecko/20040804 Netscape/7.2 (ax)

[Alice]

Glad I could help.

From what I could find on the bookmarks.html.moztmp (.MOZTEMP?), it's a temporary copy of bookmarks.html and doesn't normally exist. The file is mentioned in comment 13 of Bug 157152

If bookmarks.html is read-only, Mozilla will create bookmarks.html.moztmp (if it doesn't already exist) which is pparently a copy of bookmarks.html and is also read-only. When Mozilla closes, it creates bookmarks-1.html *and* bookmarks-2.html, and two more sequentially numbered bookmarks-{n}.html files for every subsequent time Mozilla is exited.

...which gave me the idea to tell you to check for it.

I did a groups.google search on the other spelling and came up with:

Newsgroups: netscape.public.mozilla.ui
From: James Ross <sil...@warwickcompsoc.co.uk>
Date: Fri, 26 Sep 2003 04:16:18 +0100
Subject: Re: Bookmark trouble

Adam Borgeson wrote:

> Aha! thank you very much Roland. You weren't exactly
> right, but you led me on the right track. Under
> Doc&settings, my profile, app data, and down through
> the mozilla stuff, I found a file called
> 'bookmarks.html.MOZTEMP' that was read only. So I
> unselected that, and I experimented, and now I can
> save bookmarks! how ever, the MOZTEMP file
> disappeared. Not sure why, but my program works now!

I think what happens is when Mozilla (tries to) save the bookmarks, it
saves it to bookmarks.html.MOZTEMP, then when that's done (and didn't
have any problems, presumably) it copies it over the actual bookmark file.

Bookmarks have been a weakness in Netscape 7.xx and Mozilla products, I'm afraid, and there are many bug reports outstanding, so make sure you keep a current backup copy in a safe location, away from the profile folder.

You say you're still generating extra bookmarks-n.html files based on the number of tabs you have open? Do the numbered bookmarks files accumulate from session to session?

If the multiples of bookmarks.html continue to accumulate, consider creating a new profile for Netscape 7.2 using the Start > Programs > netscape 7.xx > Profile Manager. If you have the "quick launch" feature enabled, turn that off in Edit > preferences > Advanced, before creating a new profile. And, for testing purposes, leave the default settings, including the cache location.

If the bookmarks.html file no longer replicates itself in the NEW profile, you can then import your saved bookmarks.html file using the Bookmarks Manager, and then, with Netscape closed, manually copy over other selected files (making sure none are "read-only"!) as detailed here:
http://ilias.ca/netscape/profilefaq/#transferring
...Follow the "Selectively Transferring certain data" instructions, otherwise the problem may follow to the new profile if you copy the entire .SLT folder contents.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041217

[proto57]

Oops. I believe it was "moztmp", and not "moztemp". But it's gone now, and I don't intend on changing stuff to make a new one and find out. I'll bet your search turned up another bad speller like me. Thanks again.

P.S... I love this browser. My I.E. is gathering dust already.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.7.2) Gecko/20040804 Netscape/7.2 (ax)

[Alice]

You're welcome.

If you start accumulating bookmark files again, then just give a holler here, in this thread so I will get a notice and so that others who might want to help can see the background.

Best of luck.

UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041217