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after completely deleting my history, the url "awesome" bar still suggest old websites that i used to visit.

  • 7 replies
  • 7 have this problem
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  • Last reply by ffis

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first of all, i have been using this browser for a decade but this is turning to be a very annoying thing, i don't know if FF dev team thought about this, the aswome bar actually keep tracks of your old website even if you deleted your history completely, which in my books means a privacy breach !

every website i visited before i removed my browsing history is being suggested to me by this so called "awesome" bar,

it start with the word visit *****.com

hey dev team, you do understand that when people want to delete their history the main reason is not to visit some of the old websites!


Edit: i added a picture , to give you a better perspective.

first of all, i have been using this browser for a decade but this is turning to be a very annoying thing, i don't know if FF dev team thought about this, the aswome bar actually keep tracks of your old website even if you deleted your history completely, which in my books means a privacy breach ! every website i visited before i removed my browsing history is being suggested to me by this so called "awesome" bar, it start with the word visit *****.com hey dev team, you do understand that when people want to delete their history the main reason is not to visit some of the old websites! Edit: i added a picture , to give you a better perspective.
Attached screenshots

Modified by ffis

Chosen solution

jscher2000 said

Firefox 43 modified the autocomplete drop-down to support search suggestions. This change also added that informational top item.
  • If there are no spaces in what you typed, usually that first row will show where "autofill" will take you if you press Enter or click Go.
  • If there are spaces in what you typed, that first row will show what search engine will be used if you press Enter or click Go.
.......

i tried this but it FF kept hanging, also tried an addon to fix the DB but also kept hanging. here is what i did, i uninstalled the 32 bit FF, installed Ccleaner, deleted everything using it then deleted compact DB on the left of mozzila ccleaner screen, installed 64 bit and it was fixed.

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All Replies (7)

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Items that have a blue star the the right end are bookmarked pages and you will have to delete such a bookmark.

The location bar drop down list shows history items and bookmarked pages (blue star) and websites currently opened in tabs and search suggestions. You can set what suggestions to show when you enter an URL in the location/address bar in "Options/Preferences > Privacy".

  • Tools > Options > Privacy > Location Bar: When using the location bar, suggest:
    History
    Bookmarks
    Open tabs
  • browser.urlbar.suggest.history.onlyTyped choice needs to be changed directly via the pref
  • browser.urlbar.suggest.searches choice is present in Firefox 43+ as "Show search suggestions in location bar results" in "Options/Preferences > Search" as part of the search settings
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cor-el said

Items that have a blue star the the right end are bookmarked pages and you will have to delete such a bookmark. The location bar drop down list shows history items and bookmarked pages (blue star) and websites currently opened in tabs and search suggestions. You can set what suggestions to show when you enter an URL in the location/address bar in "Options/Preferences > Privacy".
  • Tools > Options > Privacy > Location Bar: When using the location bar, suggest:
    History
    Bookmarks
    Open tabs
  • browser.urlbar.suggest.history.onlyTyped choice needs to be changed directly via the pref
  • browser.urlbar.suggest.searches choice is present in Firefox 43+ as "Show search suggestions in location bar results" in "Options/Preferences > Search" as part of the search settings

thank you for taking time to reply.

i think you did not get my concern, i am not talking about my bookmarks or history records that i did not remove, my concern is with the first suggested site you see in pic.

maybe i should have rephrased my post , the awesome bar is suggesting a website that i actually deleted when cleaning my history, it actually comes as a first suggestion when i type a related letter, in the picture, i typed the letter "U" and upwork was suggested by FF . that is a problem because i removed the website and all other history. which is a privacy concern if lets say someone else open my browser and can see a website i visited, to explain in this case, people at work can know i am looking for a new job, because of the nature of website like upwork.

as for the about:config option, i did check them before posting hence i made the post.

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You can set browser.urlbar.unifiedcomplete to false to remove the Visit page suggestion from the location bar drop down list.

You can open the about:config page via the location/address bar. You can accept the warning and click "I'll be careful" to continue.

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cor-el said

You can set browser.urlbar.unifiedcomplete to false to remove the Visit page suggestion from the location bar drop down list. You can open the about:config page via the location/address bar. You can accept the warning and click "I'll be careful" to continue.

i appreciate you trying to help,

do you know why Firefox is keeping a record of historical data such as old visited website, even though i deleted all of my history, is this how Mozilla respect the privacy of its users ?

i don't wanna make accusations, i dont know if this problem happened only to me.

but its simple, when i delete my history i dont want Firefox to keep track of deleted websites, the problem is not the suggestions - although it sucks-, the problem is old deleted data reappearing ! and i want to remove it completely

Modified by ffis

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You would have to find an older copy of the places.sqlite to recover lost history. Windows might be keeping such a copy and part of an automatically created restore point.

You can check in Windows Explorer if there is a previous version of the places.sqlite file available.

  • Right-click: Properties > Previous Versions

Note that restoring an older copy of places.sqlite will cause the lost of bookmarks create after the creation date of this places.sqlite file, so make sure to backup your bookmarks (HTML and/or JSON).

  • Bookmarks > Show All Bookmarks > Import & Backup

You can use this button to go to the current Firefox profile folder:

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Firefox 43 modified the autocomplete drop-down to support search suggestions. This change also added that informational top item.

  • If there are no spaces in what you typed, usually that first row will show where "autofill" will take you if you press Enter or click Go.
  • If there are spaces in what you typed, that first row will show what search engine will be used if you press Enter or click Go.

So that raises the question: How is it possible that in-URLbar-autofill suggests a site that you have completely cleared from Firefox (i.e., there are neither history visits nor bookmarks)?

According to a bug filed in 2013 (932036), Firefox may fail to remove visited host names from the places.sqlite database when the database has become corrupted, and even if all is well, there may be a short delay in cleaning them out to avoid locking up Firefox.

If you have allowed plenty of time for upwork to disappear, your database might be corrupted and it would be logical to test that theory by removing it. (You can keep a copy elsewhere or rename it if you think you might later want to reverse the test.)

Open your current Firefox settings (AKA Firefox profile) folder using either

  • "3-bar" menu button > "?" button > Troubleshooting Information
  • (menu bar) Help > Troubleshooting Information
  • type or paste about:support in the address bar and press Enter

In the first table on the page, click the "Show Folder" button. This should launch a new window listing various files and folders in Windows Explorer.

Leaving that window open, switch back to Firefox and Exit, either:

  • "3-bar" menu button > "power" button
  • (menu bar) File > Exit

Pause while Firefox finishes its cleanup, then rename places.sqlite to something like BADplaces.sqlite (or move it to a different folder). If you see any companion files like places.sqlite-shm or places.sqlite-wal, delete them.

Start Firefox back up again. Firefox should create a new places.sqlite database and restore your last bookmark backup to it. Does autofill behavior more normally?

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Chosen Solution

jscher2000 said

Firefox 43 modified the autocomplete drop-down to support search suggestions. This change also added that informational top item.
  • If there are no spaces in what you typed, usually that first row will show where "autofill" will take you if you press Enter or click Go.
  • If there are spaces in what you typed, that first row will show what search engine will be used if you press Enter or click Go.
.......

i tried this but it FF kept hanging, also tried an addon to fix the DB but also kept hanging. here is what i did, i uninstalled the 32 bit FF, installed Ccleaner, deleted everything using it then deleted compact DB on the left of mozzila ccleaner screen, installed 64 bit and it was fixed.