Once out of private browsing all my tabs disappeared.
Tonight when I typed Ctrl/Shift/P to screen capture using SnagIt, the Firefox browser went into private browsing. When I got out of private browsing all 40 or more tabs had disappeared. I tried using History>Restore Previous Session but that didn't bring back the lost tabs. I then tried Windows 10 System Restore but again no luck. I then tried History>Today and Last 7 days but still could not recover the lost tabs. These tabs were very important to me for my research and work. How can I get them back?
Many thanks.
Tom
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The keyboard shortcut in Firefox for Private browsing is indeed Ctrl+Shift+P. And when you use Private browsing open tabs/history is automatically deleted, that is why it is PRIVATE!
Just change the shortcut you are using for screen capturing with SnagIt, so you do not open the private browsing.
Things you could do :
Go to 3-bar menu => Privacy => Under 'History' : uncheck : 'Always use private browsing mode'
And give this add-on a try :
You can check in Windows Explorer if there is a previous version of the sessionstore.js file available.
- right-click: Properties -> Previous Versions
You can use the button on the "Help -> Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page.
- Help -> Troubleshooting Information -> Profile Directory:
Windows: Show Folder; Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder - http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Firefox
--- Maybe you have a upgrade.js-<build_id> file in the sessionstore-backups folder in the profile folder that was created with the most recent Firefox update.
Firefox uses sessionstore.js in the profile folder to store session data. Sessionstore.js is only present when Firefox is closed. The sessionstore.js file is created from recovery.js when you close Firefox and is removed and copied to previous.js when you start Firefox to make is possible to restore the session at any time.
Backup the session files in the sessionstore-backups folder in the Firefox Profile Folder to make sure not to lose possible important session data. Do NOT close Firefox when Firefox is already running.
You will normally find these files in the sessionstore-backups folder:
- previous.js (cleanBackup: copy of sessionstore.js from previous session that was loaded successfully)
- recovery.js (latest version of the sessionstore written during runtime)
- recovery.bak (previous version of the sessionstore written during runtime)
- upgrade.js-<build_id> (backup created during an upgrade of Firefox)
You can copy a file from the sessionstore-backups folder to the main profile and rename the file to sessionstore.js to replace the current file (make a backup copy of the current sessionstore.js).
See also:
I'm not sure of the exact sequence of events, but if you have 40 tabs open, then press Ctrl+Shift+p, you should get a separate new window with the purple private browsing welcome page. But when you close that window, all of the rest of your tabs should still be open.
If you have restored your previous session (History menu > Restore Previous Session) but don't see those tabs, check the History menu for recently closed windows. By default, the last three closed windows can be re-opened. Hopefully one of those has the missing tabs.
On the other hand, if you closed 40 tabs in the private window, they're gone. Only your service provider (and maybe your security software?) have a log of those requests.