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I have submitted a question about thumbnails, but it is not included under my Profile, so where is it held and how can I view it ?

  • 10 replies
  • 2 have this problem
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  • Last reply by LJones

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This is my original question.

I have disabled the New Tab thumbnails by setting auto-config to 'aboutblank' and this has ensured the New Tab page is blank. However, FF is still dumping these thumbnails onto my PC, this despite my having set the History to 'Clear Cache' on exit from FF. I have tested New Tab without thumbnails in my last FF session, yet found the thumbnails of visited Sites were on my PC. If 'Clear Cache' does not remove these thumbnails, what does ?

This is my original question. I have disabled the New Tab thumbnails by setting auto-config to 'aboutblank' and this has ensured the New Tab page is blank. However, FF is still dumping these thumbnails onto my PC, this despite my having set the History to 'Clear Cache' on exit from FF. I have tested New Tab without thumbnails in my last FF session, yet found the thumbnails of visited Sites were on my PC. If 'Clear Cache' does not remove these thumbnails, what does ?

Chosen solution

You can delete the thumbnails folder in the Firefox Profile Folder to remove stored thumbnails.

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

  • Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder

You can create a new Boolean pref browser.pagethumbnails.capturing_disabled on the about:config page and set the value to true if you want to disable the thumbnails on the about:newtab page.

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Chosen Solution

You can delete the thumbnails folder in the Firefox Profile Folder to remove stored thumbnails.

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

  • Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder

You can create a new Boolean pref browser.pagethumbnails.capturing_disabled on the about:config page and set the value to true if you want to disable the thumbnails on the about:newtab page.

Modified by cor-el

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You can find your questions using the My Contributions link: https://support.mozilla.org/questions?filter=my-contributions

Modified by jscher2000 - Support Volunteer

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Thanks for the answer, this is all very technical, so I am wary of making changes.

I had used the online facility (box at top right of New Tab page) to turn-off the thumbnails on the New Tab. I then used auto-config to set New Tab to 'aboutblank'.

On auto-config it now has the following entry :

Name : 'browser.pagethumbnails.storage_version'

Status : 'userset'

Type : 'integer'

Value : '2'

I do not know what the value '2' means and don't know if adding a new item as suggested will cause a conflict with this item.

This is the suggested new item :

Name : 'browser.pagethumbnails.capturing_disabled'

Status : 'userset' ?,

Type : 'boolean',

Value : 'true'

I will add the new entry as above if it is correct, but will it cause a conflict?

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Thanks for the 'New Contributions' Link, I have Bookmarked it !

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Further to the above, how do I add a new entry to the 'about:config' table ?

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You can create new properties in about:config by right-clicking in the list and choosing New > [entry type] from the context menu.

For true/false properties, choose New > Boolean as your entry type.

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Thanks for the advice, I have now added the new entry in 'about:config'.

I shall now log out then start a new session, visit a few Sites then log out again.

After that I will come back and report my findings.

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Thanks for the advice, I have done a tour round several Sites, using both first page and New Tab, the thumbnails are gone from my PC.

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You can also create a Boolean pref with the name browser.pageThumbs.enabled and set the value to false

  • resource:///modules/PageThumbs.jsm
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Thanks for that tip. If FF updates and reverses the changes, I'll redo what I have done already and add that one too !