Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

Resolved Question

windows showing bookmarks from old browser instead of new

by Jan 5, 2015 10:49AM PST

About six months ago, I switched from IE to Chrome, and I transferred my bookmarks successfully. Since then, I've added many bookmarks to Chrome (and deleted many others from it). Tonight, though, I noticed that when I click on "My Favorites" in the Windows (Vista) menu, it is showing me my IE bookmarks and NOT my Chrome ones.

How do I get it to show me my Chrome ones?

The main reason I'm trying to figure this out is cause I want to backup my Chrome bookmarks to a flash drive.

Discussion is locked

yuluyele has chosen the best answer to their question. View answer
20 Posts
- Collapse + Expand Details
- Collapse -
Clarification Request
I can't figure out how to edit my original post...
by yuluyele Jan 5, 2015 11:13AM PST

so I will just add here that I found a "bookmarks" file by going to this folder:

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default

When I click on the file, though, it asks me what program I want to use to open the file. I don't know. Can someone tell me? I'm not very computer literate.

- Collapse -
Edit shows when you preview your post.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jan 5, 2015 11:19AM PST

Best Answer

- Collapse -
default browser
by Jan 5, 2015 11:28PM PST
Tonight, though, I noticed that when I click on "My Favorites" in the Windows (Vista) menu, it is showing me my IE bookmarks and NOT my Chrome ones. How do I get it to show me my Chrome ones?

You need to reset Chrome as your default browser. Did you recently upgrade IE? If so, probably was asked the question if you wanted it default browser. Chrome should have a setting which will always check to see if it's the default browser.
- Collapse -
James, thank you for responding!...I was stoked cause
by yuluyele Jan 6, 2015 8:36AM PST

I thought your reply made sense and was the solution, but I just went to my Chrome settings and it says:

"The default browser is currently Google Chrome."

R. Proffitt, in his reply above, is saying that it's impossible for Chrome bookmarks to show up under "Favorites" in Windows. Have you experienced otherwise?

(Btw, I haven't had a chance yet to open that file in Wordpad, but thanks for that tip!)

- Collapse -
There is a way
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jan 6, 2015 8:43AM PST

But it involved syncing Chrome and IE bookmarks then it looked as if it worked.
Bob

- Collapse -
Ah, okay...
by yuluyele Jan 6, 2015 11:07AM PST

So, if I'm understanding you correctly, even uninstalling IE (which I was planning to do eventually regardless) would not achieve my goal here. The only way is to have IE and Chrome bookmarks synched.

That link you sent me before about how to export out of Chrome...perhaps that will be the easiest way then for me to backup my bookmarks onto a flash drive. Whenever I hear about "exporting bookmarks," I always associate it with exporting them from one browser to another, but you're saying it's possible to export them to a flash drive as well?

Also, if I export them to a flash drive, they won't disappear from Chrome will they? In other words, it's not like "cutting and pasting" the bookmarks onto my flashdrive, but rather like "copying and pasting" them?

Thanks for your responses and patience, man.

- Collapse -
Favorites
by James Denison Jan 6, 2015 9:37AM PST
R. Proffitt, in his reply above, is saying that it's impossible for Chrome bookmarks to show up under "Favorites" in Windows. Have you experienced otherwise?

Even when I used windows system, I rarely if ever used "My Favorites". I thought it odd when you indicated in past you had Chrome bookmarks in it, since I'd thought like Bob that My Favorites was specifically a windows thing. The only chance if that was true was default browser setting. Is this a situation where you just noticed it was only IE "favorites" instead of something changing with it?
- Collapse -
Oh, I can see how...
by yuluyele Jan 6, 2015 11:30AM PST

it might've seemed like I was saying that, at some point in the past, I been able to view my Chrome bookmarks in the Windows "Favorites" file and then lost that capacity. But no, I've never seen them there.

This was the first time I had looked at my Windows "Favorites" file since switching browsers from IE to Chrome many months ago. I guess I was expecting to see *both* my IE bookmarks *and* my Chrome ones there, or at least a way to indicate which of them I wanted to see, but I only saw my IE ones. Hopefully that makes sense.

- Collapse -
I did it
by James Denison Jan 6, 2015 9:20PM PST

I got curious, so I fired up my XP computer. Looked for My Favorites and it wasn't there at all. Hmm, where did it go? Seems years ago I had turned it off. I found it in Properties for the Start Menu, Taskbar area. I added it back. Discovered I could create a folder in it, in my case named "Firefox Bookmarks" and then opened that folder and created a Link to the Bookmarks.html file within my firefox profile folder. Now "My Favorites" has the Firefox bookmarks in it. When the firefox bookmarks are updated, they are immediately available in My Favorites too, including in IE.

http://glenburniemd.net/CNET/Favorites/Favorites.jpg

http://glenburniemd.net/CNET/Favorites/Favorites2.jpg

http://glenburniemd.net/CNET/Favorites/Favorites3.jpg

- Collapse -
Cool! Thanks! And nice job!
by yuluyele Jan 7, 2015 2:28PM PST

When I first read your post, I was thinking that I have no idea how to do what you're describing, but I just checked out your links and see that they're...instructions!! Happy Thanks, man!

As I mentioned in my original post, the reason I was wanting to figure out how I could get the bookmarks to show up in Windows Favorites was because, in my mind, that was the only way for me to be able to copy and paste them onto my flashdrive for backup. In this thread, it seems that a couple other options have been suggested, so I guess I'll just have to see which is easiest/simplest.

Anyway, thanks so much for your time/energy in figuring it out and making an illustrated explanation for me!

- Collapse -
Answer
Well, Chrome has no Microsoft love.
by Forum moderator Jan 5, 2015 10:52AM PST
- Collapse -
hey, thanks for the responses, R. Proffitt!
by yuluyele Jan 5, 2015 11:59AM PST

I've checked out the link you sent, but I'm not seeing the solution to my problem.

My problem is not that I can't see my Chrome bookmarks. My problem that I can't see my Chrome bookmarks *in a location that allows me to copy and paste them onto my flash drive*. If I'm in my Chrome Bookmark Manager, for instance, and I copy one of the bookmarks and then go to try to paste it onto my flash drive, I am not given the option to paste.

That's why I was wanting to know "where does Chrome save its bookmarks on Windows?" I found the answer to that question here:

http://superuser.com/questions/376366/where-does-chrome-save-its-bookmarks-on-windows

When I follow the advice given at the above link, I am indeed shown a file that says "bookmarks." But then it asks me what program I want to use to open that file, and I don't know the answer to that. If someone can tell me, I should be good to go.

Hopefully that makes sense now...(of course, it's possible that you have, indeed, understood me perfectly well and have already given me the solution. If so, sorry for being dense.)

- Collapse -
or maybe I don't even need to open the file...
by yuluyele Jan 5, 2015 12:14PM PST

maybe I can just copy and paste the whole thing.

- Collapse -
I was able to copy and paste the "bookmark" file...
by yuluyele Jan 5, 2015 12:24PM PST

to my flash drive.

So hopefully I'm at least backed up now (???) even if I don't really know how to open the file yet.

I'm guessing Google Chrome is what I would use, but I'm always afraid of pressing the wrong thing and losing all my info or something.

- Collapse -
Actually, if I open the file with Google Chrome...
by yuluyele Jan 5, 2015 12:35PM PST

I'm kind of right back where I started. There's got to be a way to open the file *in Windows* so that I can see all of the bookmarks in it and manipulate them in whatever way I want (e.g. copying and pasting individual bookmarks to a flash drive, etc.).

- Collapse -
That's another question.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jan 5, 2015 1:38PM PST
- Collapse -
open in wordpad
by James Denison Jan 5, 2015 11:26PM PST

it's an html file, which is very similar to rtf files.

- Collapse -
Answer
Well Internet explorer saves it's favorites
by Jan 7, 2015 1:09AM PST
- Collapse -
(NT) Excellent post.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jan 7, 2015 1:10AM PST
- Collapse -
Thank you for the response, orlbuckeye...
by yuluyele Jan 7, 2015 11:28AM PST

As I mentioned earlier in the thread, I went to that very same link you just posted and was, indeed, able to locate a file called "bookmarks." I then copied that file and pasted it onto my flashdrive.

So that's it? They're backed up now?

(I know that may sound like a dense question, but I'm not used to working with files. And I guess I'm also just accustomed to having the reassurance of seeing my many hundreds of individual bookmark-folders and bookmarks on my flash-drive afterwards whenever I used to backup my IE bookmarks. It also used to take like a half-hour for everything to "paste" onto the flashdrive. With Chrome, on the other hand, it shows up on my flashdrive as a single file that says "bookmarks" and it only took like a second to transfer. Basically, just wanting to make sure I've accomplished the same goal despite these differences/disparities in "appearance" and transfer time.)

Back to Computer Help forum

CNET Forums

Operating Systems
Software
Electronics & Gadgets
Hardware
Tablets & Mobile Devices
General Help
Brand Forums
Roadshow Autos
Off Topic

Other Forums

Forum Info