Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Discussion of features in Mozilla Firefox
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bbersted
Posts: 1
Joined: June 14th, 2014, 10:56 am

Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by bbersted »

Normally I would like to delete all cookies except one, that logs me into a credit card site that uses cookies for security purposes. It took me a lot of effort to find one combination that worked, However, it makes little logical sense why it works and is far from obvious. I will share my experience with others that it may solve similar problems Erasing All Cookies When Firefox 29 Closes Except Specified
Ones.

 Under TOOLS/PRIVACY/History
 Use custom settings
 Remember browsing history
 Remember search and form history
 Accept cookies from sites [Under EXCEPTIONS add sites where you do not want cookies erased when Firefox closes]
 Accept cookies form Third party sites [NEVER]
 Keep Until [The Expire]
 Clear History When Firefox Closes [Settings]
 [SETTINGS]
 When I quit Firefox, check the following
 Browsing and Download History
 Active Logins
 Forms and Search History
 Cookies
 Cache
What makes little sense is that under "keep until" deleting when firefox closes deletes the cookie I want to keep, even though I do not have have cookies checked under "clear history when firefox closes" and I have the desired cookie listed under allow "exceptions.This process of designating cookies I want retained and all others deleted when closing firefox seems unintuitive and convoluted. Other than that I love Firefox.
bbersted
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lovemyfoxy
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Joined: December 11th, 2009, 11:23 am
Location: USA

Re: Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by lovemyfoxy »

I use the add-on Cookie Whitelist, which works with the Privacy page. Sometimes you need to keep certain cookies. And for some non-commercial sites, like this one, the harmless cookie lets you avoid login every time you visit. Clearing your browsing history every time can be inconvenient if you want to go back to something you've read.
2 Desktops--Win 7 Ult.SP1 x64/6GB RAM /Firefox 52.9ESR/Waterfox64 2022.11/Thunderbird 52.9ESR/BitWarden PW Manager/Verizon FIOS wired network
tomri
Posts: 43
Joined: November 18th, 2004, 3:30 am

Re: Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by tomri »

Just adding this for the record;

There is a "better" way of retaining even individual cookies without allowing the whole domain (and without having to install any extension):
- Options->Privacy->Keep cookies: Until they expire
- clear all cookies
- visit the site that sets the cookie
- manually delete all cookies except the one you want to keep
- quit firefox and restart it
- check that the cookie is still there
- now set Options->Privacy->Keep cookies: until I close Firefox (or whatever you prefer)
This will keep the cookie for the lifetime defined by the cookie itself (which is usually longer than the session).

For this to work, make sure that "cookies" is NOT selected under "Clear history when firefox closes"
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lovemyfoxy
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Joined: December 11th, 2009, 11:23 am
Location: USA

Re: Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by lovemyfoxy »

" now set Options->Privacy->Keep cookies: until I close Firefox (or whatever you prefer)"

Wouldn't that clear all the cookies again?
Last edited by lovemyfoxy on December 12th, 2014, 3:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
2 Desktops--Win 7 Ult.SP1 x64/6GB RAM /Firefox 52.9ESR/Waterfox64 2022.11/Thunderbird 52.9ESR/BitWarden PW Manager/Verizon FIOS wired network
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dfoulkes
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Joined: June 28th, 2008, 10:31 pm
Location: Mesquite, Nevada

Re: Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by dfoulkes »

As LoveMyFoxy notes ... I also use an extension that gives me more control via a UI in order to handle cookies... though I use Cookie Monster instead. What I did long ago was to install Cookie Monster (it changes some settings in the Options area to do its thing properly) ... then I removed all cookies and then visited the sites where I want to retain cookies all the time... then from that point on when I visit a site that needs cookies I temp allow them via the Extensions button... then when Firefox closes all those temp cookies are gone... or as I do... once finished with that site... I click on the exts. button and revoke temp cookies... keeps Firefox clean.
Cookie Monster :: Add-ons for Firefox
As you can see she's (The CAT) always alert and on the prowl for Meoware !!
beeskeptical
Posts: 36
Joined: April 3rd, 2017, 12:20 pm

Re: Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by beeskeptical »

I'm having these same issues. Mozilla needs a major rethink of this system. It is at best convoluted and counter-intuitive, but generally just dysfunctional.

Just realized this thread is three years old and Mozilla hasn't fixed this bug. Impressive.

Also, tried to connect to the following page supposedly addressing this issue
https://support.mozilla.org/t5/Firefox/ ... d-p/817965
but Avast blocked it, saying:

support.mozilla.org uses an invalid security certificate.

The certificate is not trusted because the issuer certificate is unknown.
The server might not be sending the appropriate intermediate certificates.
An additional root certificate may need to be imported.

Error code: SEC_ERROR_UNKNOWN_ISSUER
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DanRaisch
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Location: Somewhere on the right coast

Re: Selective Retention of Cookies Firefox 29/30

Post by DanRaisch »

Yes, this thread is a bit old. Please start a new topic and provide details of the issue you are seeing at this time.

Locking this due to the age of the original posts, which involved versions of the program long since obsolete.
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