Backing Up NS 7.2 Profile

Ramon wrote "Delete these files:
history.dat - this is the database of all visited web pages
XUL.mfl - contains precompiled chrome and JavaScript cache for faster loading ".

Do you consider the above to be suggested steps or required steps?

I have several Profiles for different purposes. On all except 1 Profile, my History is set to 1 day & isn't important to me. On my what I'll call primary profile, History is set to 90 days to easily recognize what I've already read vs what's new on pages. I occasionally also open the History & delete unneeded entries to keep it smaller. This IS important to me.

Instead of deleting the entire history.dat as Ramona wrote, is there instead an indicator to watch for such as not letting it exceed a certain size? Is that documented as a bug or anywhere that it causes corruption beyond a certain size? The current size is 6,868 KB.

Re XUL.mfl: I'd just appreciate understanding this a little more. Is this simply the Caches? In Netscape Preferences Advanced there is a Clear Cache. Within my PrefBar Extension there are options to clear Memory Cache or Disk Cache or Both. I clear both often. Is this the XUL.mfl or something different? What I'm more interested to know, is what is the negative(s) upon deleting XUL.mfl? Is it just a very temporary slower loading? (Sorry if I haven't expressed the questions well).

Thank you.

 

Suggested by Netscape, but not written in stone. The history.dat file often becomes corrupt. The XUL.mfl file grows to an enormous size, and therefore can cause problems with the browser, and also with Mail. It is separate from the Memory and Disk Cache.

See this page for information on the Netscape Profile Files:
http://gemal.dk/mozilla/files.html

You can also do a bug search here on the files:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/query.cgi

Here is a search I did for history.dat

Here is a search I did for XUL.mfl
(Bugzilla is very slow tonight so be patient when loading these pages...)

This will give you an idea of what can happen when the files become corrupt, and aren't maintained.

You can find much more by Googling, visiting the Mozilla Knowledge Base, and following links on the pages themselves.

Ramona

 

Marklet,

I knew if I scrounged around a bit more that I would find better explanations of the XUL.mfl file for you:

xul.mfl
xul.mfasl (Linux/BSD) This is a cache file for the UI, (user interface) bookmarks, cookies, settings, etc. It's used to cache the internal representation of data so it doesn't have to be reparsed. XUL.MFL in which MFL stands for Mozilla Fast Load. It makes the application run faster by caching all of your favorite windows, etc. in Mozilla, Netscape, Firefox, and Thunderbird.

Sometimes, this file can become corrupt, and in such cases, it can be deleted because it is a cache, and it will be recreated on next startup (though the said startup may take a few milliseconds longer).

Tip: If you're having problems upgrading or downgrading Mozilla or Firefox (for example, it won't start) try deleting this file.
---

Ramona

 

Thank you very much Ramona.

May I suggest you include some of this data (when you have time) on the page where you suggest deleting this file (especially the paragraph beginning with "Sometimes" or similar)? IMHO, that would be useful knowledge for people to know they 'basically' lose nothing by deleting it.

 

Thanks Ramona for your reply & the info. FYI, even with patience & trying at different times, the above links haven't loaded; eventually they I guess 'time out' resulting in an "(Untitled)" tab. I'll try again @ other times.

When you looked at them did you find any info on whether the size of history.dat has any connection to possible corruption, & any data on a suggested max size?

This is probably not connected, but I've found that since NS7, the History file whether new or old (small or large) is 'slow' when rearranging the view or especially responding to deleting an entry (& I don't even 'attempt' to delete multiple entries anymore because that increases the delay compared to adding the time to delete each alone).

 

Marklet,

There are 200 bugs per search, and it does take a while for them to load. I didn't take the time to read them.

I would think that the size of your history.dat file accounts for the slowness. That's a whopping history file, and a first to hear about one that size...

BTW, deleting the history, and Cache file have been recommended browser maintenance since the early days of Netscape Communicator.

Ramona

 

Nope, sorry but as I said before the slowness in editing NS History has been present since the first NS7 without regard to the size of the file (so the size may relate to corruption, but evidently not to speed, - at least not on my PC).

As to the "whopping" whopper size, it's been larger at times. If I knew a specific limit (with some degree of certainty), I'd then divide my bookmarks of regularly visited sites into 2 Profiles. I read alot (I mean alot alot) as I often multitask surf while working on the phone. Yes, I am able to listen to someone & visit sites & read simultaneously. My short term attention / multitasking / memory have always been quite high. My long term memory has deteriorated too much with age & medications. Part of my memory 'survival' was an executive seminar very early in my career which taught that the most effective way to remember 'important' things (besides fallback to documentation) is to conciously select items for front of the brain memory, but more important to conciously not remember 'unimportant' items (what you ate yesterday, the colors of buildings/homes on routes you regularly drive etc). Another point was to know what sources to trust & remember only the important points or bottom line without needing to recall the source (of course this works much better when communicating data to people whose trust you already earned and to people who basically need to accept your executive decision).

I remember once trying to find out on some other Netscape Forum back in the heydays of 4.6 if there were actual or suggested limits on the size of History and the size of Mail Folders, but no one knew.

 

I am not sure of any reason why, I, at least, would care to save history. In fact, I save it for as short a time as I can get away with, and I use the prefbar on top of it. At my age, it would not matter to have a long history. I would not remember what it was about! But, that's me, and not you. My largest history.dat file grew to 40Kb, and the Prefbar treatment brought it down. Deleting is not necessary. As for the xul.mfl file it is part-time bug, because it write the same info over and over, up to a point. Three out of four NS7.2 profiles were up to 3700 KB, and I deleted the files.
I think that you are bringing up some valid points, but, I never aim for the maximum, but rather the minimum, if ever possible. There is nothing which bugs me more than to hear that someone "lost" GBs worth of mail. I could never deal with anything like that. I remember that I was freaking out when I exceeded 100 e-mails in a folder. Then,I dropped to 50, and now about 30. Everything else gets stored away.
But, it is very interesting to see how others try to deal with everyday problems. Why only one icon/ message?

 

"I remember that I was freaking out when I exceeded 100 e-mails in a folder ". I have email folders with thousands of files in Bloomba (previously in NS 4.6). I've never lost any. Email is a big part of my work. I use it to store resumes. NS 4.6 had the best client features including the search capacity & speed of search that was most important to me till the much faster Bloomba came along (you can't get it anymore because Yahoo bought it but hasn't released it or anything based on it yet).

"But, it is very interesting to see how others try to deal with everyday problems ". I agree.

"Why only one icon/ message?" Sorry, I don't understand your question. Please explain.

 

"Sorry, I don't understand your question. Please explain. "

Sure, it has nothing to do with you. It deals with this webboard. I was thinking of the icon for messages to choose when posting.
Sometimes I have mixed feeling, like thumb up and down, at the same time