Old Profiles

[RobertJ]

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I have been using the same default profile for over 12 years. When I started using 57 Nightly I copied my default profile into the Nightly profile and started cleaning our old extensions. After 14+ weeks of 57 Nightly and 57 Beta I had 57 operating just the way I wanted. Nine WebX extensions [still waiting for one to be ported], eight userChrome tweaks, toolbars my way, .....

I after looking in the directory I wondered how much residual garbage was there. I created a new blank profile using the latest 57rc. I then transferred bookmarks, favicons, logins, userChrome tweaks, ... to the new profile. Then installed the WebX extensions along with data that I exported from the “default”.

The results surprised me.

Old default --> New

Size
232M --> 98M

Files & Directories
1564 --> 153



No garbage collection in FF profiles!


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[mightyglydd]

Interesting, I'd wondered about that ..in the past I've always used a clean profile for any major update,

[Brummelchen]

v54: 104 MB 776 files, 174 folders
v57: 147 MB 296 files, 68 folders

migrating without care is no good i say. too much trash remaining. i suggest a clean start:

This article explains how to selectively transfer Firefox user data and settings to a new Firefox profile
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Transferring_ ... _-_Firefox

[RobertJ]

This article explains how to selectively transfer Firefox user data and settings to a new Firefox profile
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Transferring_ ... _-_Firefox

Old article with some incorrect and missing information. Anyone that has used FF for a number of years knows how to accomplish that.

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[GHM113]

Look into datareporting folder, you'll get surprised. Mine has 3700 files. What's worse, I deleted them all but they all resurrected from the dead a couple weeks later. Looks like Mozilla adores telemetry.

[RobertJ]

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I think you can disable that under

Preferences > Privacy & Security > Firefox Data Collection and Use

EDIT: That doesn't seem to work.

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[RobertJ]

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I came up with a hack to solve the data collection [at least for Mac] and datareporting folder clutter.

I set my outbound firewall Little Snitch to only allow outbound TCP connections to ports 80 (http) and 443 (https). To stop the buildup of crap in the datareporting folder I wrote a simple script to delete the datareporting folder in my default profile and then launch FF.

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[smsmith]

I've found sync helpful to me in creating new profiles. Brings my bookmarks, history and saved passwords, and the couple of preference settings I've changed are fairly ingrained, so flipping those is easy enough. Plus it gives me a chance to revisit the options and see how they've changed them. I don't have a lot of extensions anymore, so hunting down the handful is pretty easy. I choose to leave addons unchecked in the sync settings, though I am considering changing that as my Nightly and Release profiles don't really differ anymore.

[therube]

So just what comprised those 1,411 files/directories?

[RobertJ]

So just what comprised those 1,411 files/directories?

After 12 years probably some old extension things that were never cleared. And things like a directory called ABE and its contents, cert_override.txt, dh-ldata.json. dh-media-lists.rdf, reading-list.sqlite, ....


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[therube]

(ABE is from NoScript.)

[RobertJ]

(ABE is from NoScript.)

After 12 years probably some old extension things that were never cleared.

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[Duck_Dodgers]

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I came up with a hack to solve the data collection [at least for Mac] and datareporting folder clutter.

I set my outbound firewall Little Snitch to only allow outbound TCP connections to ports 80 (http) and 443 (https). To stop the buildup of crap in the datareporting folder I wrote a simple script to delete the datareporting folder in my default profile and then launch FF.

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I also ran into this on Windows 7. Just found a note I must have gotten from this forum at some point for an about:config switch-

"To stop the creation of many, small telemetry files in Firefox, even though it is all turned off, set

toolkit.telemetry.archive.enabled to false."

Mike

[RobertJ]

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Did that and no joy.

EDIT: Using FF57

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[Duck_Dodgers]

Hmmm... It's been working here on two Win 7 PCs.

Good point about the version. I'm currently on Firefox ESR 52.4.0 (64-bit). I don't recall which version I was running when I started using this switch.

I don't know a thing about MACs. Is it possible that you need to restart the computer - in case it's retaining Firefox certain configs in cache, even though Firefox isn't running? You'd think it wouldn't, but... Heh! Heh! Or is that a stupid question?