Can I sync open tabs while in incognito mode?
I was trying to sync some tabs currently opened in incognito mode from my android 8 tablet to my pc and it did not work. No new tabs are shown in the synchronized tabs section of the firefox account menu accessed from the button on the toolbar. I also tried syncing while both tablet and pc were in incognito mode, but no tabs are shown in the incognito window either.
I could understand if it were designed this way. Personally, I think the whole instruction on firefox sync is too basic and should be expanded. I was thinking about doing it myself but I wanted to run this particular functionality by the community before I consider it a fact.
Edit: I'm also unable to send open tabs from pc to tablet, incognito or not. I have v67.0.4 on pc and 67.0.3 on android. As far as I know, the only way to interact with your firefox account in the mobile version is to go to settings -> account. Synced bookmarks go to a new bookmark folder, e.g. desktop-bookmarks. Same for history. But I don't know where to look for synced tabs. I'd expect them to just appear among your opened tabs as soon as you sync you account, but that clearly doesn't happen. But the fact that [right-click tab-> send to device] on a desktop tab lists the tablet as a target, and even displays a SENT! message, suggests that it should be possible.
Modified by whathappenedtothepanda
All Replies (4)
I don't think Sync should pick up either history or open tabs from private windows/tabs. That information should be restricted to the original device where they were viewed, and only until the session ends.
If you want to send the currently open private tab from Android to another device connected to your Sync account, you can use
menu button > Share icon > Send to other devices
Firefox should give you a list of other Firefox installations currently connected to the same Firefox account. On the receiving Firefox for Windows, click
menu button > Sync Now (circling arrows button next to your account name)
The sent tab should open. Does that work on yours?
And please do help out with articles that need enhancement. Thank you!
Thank you very much! It hadn't occurred to me to try the share button. Interestingly, there is no need to manually sync when you send a tab that way, which I find very useful.
As for incognito mode, sending tabs through share works, while syncing tabs does not. However, because the incognito tab is opened in a normal tab on the receiving end, it does become logged in history there. So if you are sharing history, the next time you sync it will share these secret spicy ones as well.
Perhaps slightly unrelated, but the android version has a special folder that only contains the history from a connected device. I prefer this to having the history of all devices thrown onto one big pile, but that actually happens too. And the pc version of firefox does not have such a separate history folder for each connected device and puts it all into one big list as well. All considered, I'm having some trouble seeing the overall plan here.
Unfortunately, all this still does not allow me to send a tab from pc to tablet. Instead, I'll have to sync history (which is not possible if it concerns an incognito tab).
It's interesting to hear your experience; I don't use Sync on my main desktop profile, just a secondary profile I use to occasionally back up my mobile bookmarks.
Perhaps there is a discreet extension which can manage the private tabs, but a few searches didn't turn up anything interesting. (I thought of Hush Bookmarks but don't understand how it works on mobile.)
An Hush review shows: doesn't work for mobile browser, which is the platform where private bookmarks are most needed..