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Firefox and Thunderbird Firefox users need to back up regularly to guard against the possibility that their profile gets corrupted or wiped after installing a new extension or a new version of Firefox. If you use Thunderbird then it's even more important that you back up to ensure you don't accidentally lose your email correspondence and account settings.
There are two ways to back up: use a backup utility or do it yourself manually.
Backup Utilities
MozBackup is a free utility written by Pavel Cvrcek that will automatically back up Firefox and Thunderbird as well as Netscape and the full Mozilla suite. In fact, the most recent versions will also back up Mozilla Sunbird, Flock and Spicebird.
It works like a charm - the whole process is driven by a Wizard so easy to use that even raw beginners will be able to set up automatic backups. It also offers encryption of the backup files and a complete push-button restore option.
MozBackup only backs up the essential information rather than all the information in your Mozilla profile, but that's fine for most users. You can get MozBackup here: http://mozbackup.jasnapaka.com/
If you only need to back up Firefox, an excellent, perhaps superior, alternative is the free FEBE Firefox extension. Initially designed for backing up extensions, it now offers the options of backing up various sections of your profile such as bookmarks, cookies, auto-complete, etc. Most importantly, it allows you to back up your entire profile just by checking a single box. Full or selective restore is available. Thanks to site visitor Anupam Shriwatri for the suggestion. FEBE is available from here: http://customsoftwareconsult.com/extensions/febe/febe.html
There are also a couple of commercial utilities that will back up Firefox and Thunderbird. I've not used them but you can find details at http://www.rinjanisoft.com/
Manual Backup
Backing up Firefox and Thunderbird manually is as simple as copying their respective profile folders to another location. If you do that, you’ll have a full backup with all your setting and personal data saved.
An advantage of manual backup is that you don't need to have Firefox or Thunderbird functioning in order to restore your backup; it's just a case of copying the backup profiles. That's a good thing because the most common reason you want to restore is that your Firefox or Thunderbird installation is not working!
The hardest part is finding the profile folders. First up, they are not located where you would expect to find them. Secondly, they are located in different places for different versions of Windows. Thirdly, they may be assigned random file names that make them difficult to recognize.
On Windows 2000/XP machines the locations for your Firefox and Thunderbird profiles are respectively:
- C:\Documents and Settings\<Windows login/user name>\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<Profile name>\
- C:\Documents and Settings\<Windows login/user name>\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<Profile name>\
- C:\Windows\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<Profile name>\
- C:\Windows\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<Profile name>\
If you can't locate your profiles then check out this document for more information: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_Folder#What_is_in_my_profile?
On my XP laptop the profiles are:
- C:\Documents and Settings\Ian\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\default.ebq
-
C:\Documents and Settings\Ian\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\25ve0lz5.default
To back these up I copy the profiles to an external USB drive. It's as simple as that. I do it manually but you could also use Windows Scheduler or a backup manager to do the job automatically. Make sure, though, that Firefox and Thunderbird are not running before you back up.
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No mention of Vista??
Vista Location
C:\Users\<WindowsLogin-UserName>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\...
AppData may be a hidden file
Here is a cool article http://www.tips4pc.com/Bookmarks/Bookmarks.htm
It includes:
Exporting Bookmarks from Firefox
Importing Bookmarks into Firefox
Exporting Internet Explorer Favorites
Import Firefox Bookmarks into Internet Explorer Favorites
Import saved Favorites back into Internet Explorer
A note on manual backup - reimport of Thunderbird data.
If you use the manual method, there are 2 things that don't get saved:
message filters
dictionary
So I guess there is some stuff in Program Files that needs to be grabbed.
chris.p
I’ve pretty important email of my client which I’ve lost. Could you please describe how to recover using the backup of Mozilla thunderbird?
If you used the mozbackup plugin, and chose Save all options, then you should get everything. Some plugins might not make the trip though - but this seems more of a problem with Firefox, Thunderbird has worked OK for me with mozbackup.
If you used the manual backup method, then all the email will be in that Application Data folder.
I use 2 PCs for this, I backup to another PC with Thunderbird installed but no Net access (so it can't go online and get mail), then you can see what it's got or what's missing. The big file in Application Data of hundreds of MB is your mail. If something's missing out of that then there has been some sort of other issue.
chris.p
I don't know or care what a 'user profile' is, I just want to back up my Bookmarks. In 2.0 and below, all I had to do was create a folder on my desktop, open Firefox> Bookmark Manager>File>Export, then save to the folder I created, and I had a back-up that could be read by ANY browser, and showed my Bookmarks like a word document, showing the names of everything I bookmarked.
I could export my bookmarks to a folder on my desktop, and then put that back-up on a flash drive, and put that back-up on ANY Windows computer desktop, open it up like a word document and see the name (description) of every web site I had book marked. Thanks to the "New and Improved" Bookmark Manager in 3.0, I can no longer open the Bookmark back-up like a document and see the name of every web site I book marked. Plus, my only option is to import 50 or 100 Bookmarks, even if I only want to import a couple of them.
If that were not bad enough, now a back-up (from FF 3.0) can only be imported by FF 3.0! A previous version of FF will not open or import a back-up from 3.0 , nor will any other browser.
Unfortunately, the Bookmark Manager features in version 3.0. are now devoid of any usefulness to me. For me, the "New and Improved" Bookmark Manager has made IE6 superior to Firefox 3.0! The Bookmark Manager is much more difficult and counter-intuitive in FF3.0. With FF 1.5, a person who had never seen a computer before could learn everything there is to know about managing Bookmarks in 30-40 seconds.
Not being able to export (back-up) Bookmarks forced me to abandon Firefox, and start trying out alternatives.
I think being an overreacting idiot did that, actually.
Export to HTML, instead of the native JSON which FF3.0's new bookmark manager uses, and you keep using your beloved Firefox. Exporting to HTML is what 2.0 did to begin with, and if I remember correctly even then It was called "Export to HTML" and not "Backup". I'm baffled by how you got confused, but not surprised.
Short tempers and technology do not mix.
The bookmarks in FF 3.0 are saved as json file. But you can save the file as HTML too. Click "Organize Bookmarks" ----> "Import and Backup" ----> Export HTML. You can also import the whole backup of bookmarks the same way.. choosing Import HTML instead of export.
Anupam Shriwatri, India
Quick question: When doing the manual backup, is it possible to just copy the profile and paste it on a different OS? i.e. If i copy my Thunderbird profile from a Windows XP Machine and paste it on a Mac OS X Leopard Thunderbird (pasting of course to the correct directory). Will that work????
Thanks!
It should - that's how I usually back up my Thunderbird settings, just grab the whole profile. When I add it back to a new installation, I've always had to put the all the files of the profile (verses the Profile Folder itself) into the new profile folder.
I'm not sure that's how it works in a Mac, but I think the structure of the program is basically the same across all OS's.
Here's another good tip from this site: http://email.about.com/cs/mozillatips/qt/et082002.htm
"Find Your Mozilla Thunderbird Profile Directory
To locate and open the folder where Mozilla Thunderbird keeps your profile including settings and messages:
On Windows:
* Select Run... from the Start menu.
* Type "%appdata%" (without the quotes).
* Hit Return.
* Open the Thunderbird folder.
* Go to the Profiles folder.
* Now open the folder of your Mozilla Thunderbird profile (probably "********.default" where the '*'s stand for random characters) and the folder beneath it.
On Mac OS X:
* Open your home folder.
* Go to the Library folder.
* Open the Thunderbird and then the Profiles folders.
* Open your profile's directory (probably "********.default" where the '*'s stand for random characters).
On Linux:
* Go to the ".thunderbird" directory in your home "~" directory.
* Open the profile directory (probably "********.default" where the '*'s stand for random characters).
RE: Thunderbird on Mac
According to this site: http://www.freeemailtutorials.com/mozillaThunderbird/backupRestore.cwd Macs store T-bird data here: "Mac OS X ~/Library/Thunderbird"
Where is the profile located for Max OS X 10.5.6? I see a similar question above, but no answer.
Thank you
You can force Mozilla Firefox and Thunderbird to use a more 'reasonable' storage directory than "C:\Documents and Settings\\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\\"
First, back up your profile manually as suggested in the article.
Start Thunderbird with -profilemanager to bring up a dialog that allows you to manage your Tbird profiles. Create a new profile in a more reasonable place, say, d:\PersonalData\Tbird\.
Thunderbird creates the directory and populates it with some default stuff. On startup, it asks you for some information to get going. Cancel out of this, and close Thunderbird.
Delete the new, default data that Thunderbird just created in your new, reasonably-named folder. Replace it with your backed up data.
Again, run Thunderbird with -profilemanager, and ensure that it starts up with your new profile.
Thunderbird will work with the backed up directory structure. You've successfully moved your Tbird profile! Run Thunderbird with -profilemanager one last time, and remove your old profile. Never again dig through "c:\Users and Settings" or whatever to do a simple backup.
Be careful! Nobody's responsible if you bork up your email stash!
Hello Gizmo,
I keep my Thunderbird profile folder in a different place; in my documents folder on my data drive (D: drive). Thunderbird allows me to select a different profile location in the "Account Settings > Server Settings" window.
So, I tried an experiment with Mozbackup to see how it would work with the different location. I made a copy of my Thunderbird profile folder (with copy/paste), then I used MozBackup to backup Thunderbird. Then I deleted my Thunderbird profile folder, and tried restoring from Mozbackup.
Mozbackup did not fare very well. Each time I would try the restore it would reset Thunderbird's profile location setting from my D: drive to the default location on the C: drive, and it would restore the profile data to the C: drive as well. If that weren't enough, I found the restored profile data (that was restored to the incorrect location on the C: drive) was missing the actual emails.
So, I think MozBackup may have a few problems when a non-standard profile location is used, although it's very possible I am doing something wrong.
Thanks, Gizmo. I love the great information you provide to us.
Randy
Hi
What I want to do is move thunderbird profile to a new partition on my hard drive so how do I do that ? I have tried one method but TB just keeps making a new folder as tho it was a fresh download . So any help is appreciated
thanks
I tried to restore a profile, but using the technique described above for manual backup and restore, it seems to have lost all my saved passwords. Are they not saved in the Profile?
They should be in the profile unless you are using a third party app like Roboform
One thing that Gizmo doesn't mention is that FEBE has a great counterpart called CLEO that takes the FEBE backups and combines them into one XPI file for you to do a single install and voila you have all of your extensions installed..
http://customsoftwareconsult.com/extensions/cleo/cleo.html
HTH,
Kent
Good stuff. Now, all I need to do is hunt down (putting on pith helmet and taking up .50 caliber air rifle *heh*) the right folder in Ubuntu...
;-)
Can I back up firefox 3, the restore my profile to firefox 2?
Ken D.- California
Another program I have found very useful on a couple of occasions for backing up both Firefox and Thunderbird is BackUpFox. I use both MozBackup and BackupFox to back up my profiles in Firefox and Thunderbird and both have saved my bacon a couple of times. The most recent when I bought a new computer. What I like about both is that not only can you backup but also restore very easily. BackupFox backs up the whole profile. Can be downloaded from http://www.neowin.net/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t291258.html
or
http://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/Browser-Tweak/BackupFox.shtml
among others. Just type BackupFox into Google or other Search engine
Alan Noble
Sydney Australia
Once again - thank you. This is my #1 go-to site.
I backed up Thunderbird from my desktop system (Win XP Pro) and then restored it on my laptop (Win XP Home) prior to traveling. The restore appeared to work BUT on the main panel, the subject, sender, recipient, and date are unreadable. Every other entry has been over written on superimposed with another one. If I click on these I can read the email but entries are are screwed up.
Can anyone help?
George
What about Mac? Where are the profile folders which contain the user data for Firefox? Thanks in advance.
You can find the locations in Windows Vista at
C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Local\Mozilla
Just fyi. :)
I don't think that's correct.
The profiles in Vista are at C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla for Firefox and C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming\Thunderbird for, well, Thunderbird. At least that's were they are on my machine, which is running Vista Home Premium.
I confirm the locations for my Vista Home Premium. Also, I found Sunbird data files at the C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla location.
thanks for the help
Is it possible to backup a Firefox profile created using Win2000 and move the profile to an new system running XP?
It should work. Let me know if it doesn't
Theres also an extension available for taking backup of firefox. Its FEBE. It can peform selective backup .. or a whole profile backup and is quite useful.
Anupam Shriwatri, India
Good suggestion. I've incorporated this into my recommendations.
I used the mozBackup for my thunderbird, but it only restored one of my email account's mail. Any idea where the other accounts mail have gone?
There is a shortcut to the profile folder in Win2000/XP In "run" just type %APPDATA%
Thanks Gizmo, your site is excellent
Very nicely done Gizmo, I was always confused about this, and you helped me with this "How to" guide!
Thanks,
Edward A. Weissbard-El Paso, TX
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