Tab groups lost on restart, can't restore from previous session

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Before submitting the issue, please check that your version of TabGroups
Manager is the lastest stable one. (Check it in Firefox Extensions).

What steps will reproduce the problem?
1. Have two FF windows, each with several tab groups, some open, some suspended
2. Restart FF.
3. Observe that one window will have all groups, both open and suspended, but 
the
   other window will only have the ones that were open at the time of restart.

What is the expected output? What do you see instead?

System Info:
What version of TabGroups Manager are you using?   2011.11.28.1
What Operative System are you using?  Ubuntu 14.04.  32 or 64 bits?  64
What version of Firefox are you using?  29
Are you using any other tab extension like Colorfull tabs, Multiple Tab
Handler, TabMix Plus..?  Tab Mix Plus, Multiple Tab Handler, Tabs Menu,
Session Manager

Please provide any additional information below and screens capture if possible.

Up to now, I've always been able to get back the missing groups by doing a 
manual restore of the previous session.  Since I upgraded to Ubuntu 14.04 with 
FF 29, this no longer works.

I had a situation a while back where I also had trouble getting back lost 
groups from previous sessions, but was able to get them back somehow, but I 
don't remember the details or the incantations I needed in order to do this.  

At any rate, I've lost a ton of tabs and would like to get them back.  I'm sure 
they're out there somewhere, but I'm not sure how to get at them.  If they're 
truly lost, I do have a backup from a couple of weeks ago or so that I could 
get them from, but I'm guessing they'll get lost again on the next restart.

I've bumped into this sort of problem every so often with TGM, but this is the 
first time I haven't been able to find a workaround.

Original issue reported on code.google.com by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 7 May 2014 at 1:16

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I am running on Ubuntu 14.04 and FF 29.
To restore tabs i find that I need to export the tgm session by clicking on the
green star icon. Then when I want to restart FF I delete the files 
/home/'user'/.mozilla/firefox/"jibberish".default/sessionstore.js and 
sessionstore.bak
start FF then drag and drop the file you exported into the FF window.
It will ask if you want to overwrite the current seesion click yes
if you have lots of tabs you might get a script taking long time error
tick the checkbox and click continue.

After a couple of min you should have your groups and tabs back. 
Just remember to export the groups before you exit.

I am looking into using one of the backups found in
/home/'usre'/.mozilla/firefox/'gibberish'.default/tabgroupsmanagerdata/save_data
but the above has worked for me so I have not spent the time on it.

You can change the frequency of backups in TGM options.
Hope it helps. This is such an important addon that I dont want to use my 
computer with out it. I keep 1025 tabs in 32 groups.

Original comment by irishban...@gmail.com on 11 May 2014 at 5:03

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The above workaround didn't work for me.

But I do have some additional data points:

- If I have two browser windows, one window only restores non-suspended groups, 
whereas the other one restores everything, including suspended groups.

- If I move all groups to one window and restart, only the non-suspended groups 
are restored.

- After trying the above workaround, firefox starts up empty, so I have to 
manually restore everything.

All this leads me to believe that TGM no longer plays well with FF session 
restore.

I really hate to lose this addon, since without it or a reasonable equivalent, 
there's no way I can reasonably manage the large number of tabs I've 
accumulated.  Sure, I could convert my groups to bookmarks, but that's much 
less convenient.  And if I were to bookmark everything that I currently leave 
around in tab groups, I'd have much more chaos, since it's more convenient to 
clean up tab groups than bookmarks.

TGM is badly needed, but right now, it's unusable. 

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 13 May 2014 at 4:00

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I have the same problem as OP.  For the solution, where do you find the "green 
star"?

Original comment by dbate...@gmail.com on 26 Jun 2014 at 2:35

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If you righclick add customize the displayed buttons you can add the TGM green 
blue etc buttons. 

Or you can right click one of your groups and choose session> export-session.

The tooltip when you hover over export session says "export session to file. 
DRag and drop file into firefox window to replace session.

See screenshots

Original comment by irishban...@gmail.com on 27 Jun 2014 at 10:21

Attachments:

• [Screenshot from 2014-06-27 17:18:24-2.png](https://storage.googleapis.com/google-code-attachments/tabgroupsmanager/issue-47/comment-4/Screenshot from 2014-06-27 17:18:24-2.png)
• [Screenshot from 2014-06-27 17:18:35-2.png](https://storage.googleapis.com/google-code-attachments/tabgroupsmanager/issue-47/comment-4/Screenshot from 2014-06-27 17:18:35-2.png)

[GoogleCodeExporter]

My groups are gone so there's nothing to right-click and export, otherwise that 
would work for me.  I see the sessions I want listed but click and nothing 
loads. Perhaps they're empty? Perhaps it's not loading them? Ideas?

Original comment by ajmesa...@gmail.com on 15 Aug 2014 at 4:57

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On ubuntu the saved sessions are in 
/home/username/.mozilla/firefox/profile.default/tabgroupsmanagerdata/save_data
I can drag and drop some of the saved .tgm2 files into FF the way i described 
above and it will replace the session with the saved one. Look at the date 
modified and the size of the file to find one to try and restore. You might 
have to try more than 1 to get your groups and tabs back.

On windows I dont know where the profile is exactly
Some where close to 
/Users/'name'/AppData/Local/Mozilla/Firefox/Profiles/'profile'/tabgroupsmanagerd
ata/save_data

Original comment by irishban...@gmail.com on 15 Aug 2014 at 8:24

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Some Session bugs fixed after some hours this night hehe, sorry for the insane 
delay, new beta 3 soon :)

Hope it could fix most of the session issues. I have also a lot of information 
to add related to this issue, and other important information about the future 
of TGM :)

Original comment by tabgroup...@gmail.com on 19 Aug 2014 at 1:12

[GoogleCodeExporter]

I tried Beta 3 on FF 30, but suspended groups still don't restore.  Also, since 
loading this beta, Tab Mix Plus no longer displays multiple lines of tabs.

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 3 Sep 2014 at 4:05

[GoogleCodeExporter]

 Tab Utilities 1.5.28.1 displays multiple tab rows fine.
http://addons.mozilla.org/addon/59961

I dont understand suspended groups so I dont know how to test to see how its 
supposed to work.

Original comment by irishban...@gmail.com on 3 Sep 2014 at 7:58

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[deleted comment]

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roger I don't understand if you managed to restore your session.
Do you have this option set in TGM?
http://prntscr.com/4jec67
If so by right-clicking blue button you have been shown you should have several 
session to pick from.

Apart from saving a session automatically every 20 minutes I also save one 
manually every day and regularly bookmark all groups.
I have been using TGM since its inception and have gone through enough scares 
as it is :D

I have your same issue with suspended groups on anything after Fox 28.

Original comment by NeverCro...@gmail.com on 3 Sep 2014 at 9:41

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@#11
Yes, I have the session menu option turned on.
Yes, I did manage to restore the session with everything but the suspended 
groups.  The session didn't restore automatically on startup - I had to do a 
manual restore using the saved session menu.  Some of the suspended groups were 
listed in the closed groups list, but not all.  I had to go back to an earlier 
session where I'd had everything open in order to get those back.
I'm still missing a number of groups that I lost when this problem first showed 
up.  I have a filesystem backup I should be able to get those from once TGM is 
working again.

@10
Suspended groups are groups that have been "put to sleep", so to speak, and are 
no longer kept around in memory, but remain on the groups bar and can be 
re-activated by clicking on them.  This is different from closed croups, which 
disappear entirely except in the closed groups list for a while, and from 
hibernated groups, which are removed from the groups bar, but saved.  As far as 
I can tell, I haven't lost hibernated groups.  I haven't looked closely enough 
at the closed groups list to see if it's behaving properly, but it appears to 
do so at least somewhat.
Suspend is necessary for anyone with a lot of groups containing a lot of tabs, 
since keeping them all open makes firefox unbearably slow, even on a machine 
lots of cores and a lot of memory.

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 1:04

[GoogleCodeExporter]

@10
You're right, Tab Utilities does work with multi-line.  I disabled Tab Mix Plus 
and added Tab Utilities, and now I have multi-line back.

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 1:38

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Oh I understand suspended groups now  Thank-you.

Original comment by irishban...@gmail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 2:27

[GoogleCodeExporter]

I should add that I've since put all my groups into one window.  Whereas with 
two windows one of the windows did restore suspended groups, with one window no 
suspended groups are restored.

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 5:44

[GoogleCodeExporter]

roger do you use BarTab extension by any chance?
If so which version?

Original comment by NeverCro...@gmail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 11:34

[GoogleCodeExporter]

No, I don't.  Should I?

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 4 Sep 2014 at 11:36

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Well you could since it helps reduce memory but I was asking regarding the 
suspended groups going lost.

Try disabling this option:
http://prntscr.com/4jsg42
Than save a session manually, unload a group, save another session manually and 
close Fox.
Restart and try to restore the second saved session to see if the unloaded 
group is still there.

Original comment by NeverCro...@gmail.com on 5 Sep 2014 at 2:24

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roger can you post a list with your extensions?

To do so you can use several addons like Extension List Dumper.

Original comment by NeverCro...@gmail.com on 7 Sep 2014 at 12:10

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Extension list dumper is incompatible with FF 30.

Original comment by roger.st...@googlemail.com on 10 Sep 2014 at 11:25

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Hello,

many of you here have already reported to have problems with the automatic 
Backup, which places TGM automatically as you quit Firefox. I would like to 
contribute following:

I have tested this with Firefox 31-33, with the version 2013.08.21.003 and 
2014.09.18.004 of TGM. each of them without any further addons and each time 
with a fresh installation of FF.

I have located the mistake but have not come to a solution yet.

If you look at the Files (.tgm2)....

Here with the manual Backup everything is fine...
backup_data_manually_2014_10_21_19_05_03_0.tgm2:
TabGroupsManager:SaveData:version 2.0
Sleeping Groups:0
Closed Groups:0
Browser State:1
{"windows":[{"tabs":[{"entries":[{"url":"http://hmpg.net/","title":"End of the 
Internet","ID":2,"docshellID":5,"docIdentifier":2}],"lastAccessed":1413911103357
,"hidden":false,"attributes":{},"image":"http://hmpg.net/favicon.ico","extData":
{"TabGroupsManagerGroupId":"1","TabGroupsManagerGroupName":"Start"},"index":1}],
"selected":1,"_closedTabs":[],"busy":false,"width":"960","height":"579","screenX
":"4","screenY":"4","sizemode":"maximized"}],"selectedWindow":1,"_closedWindows"
:[],"session":{"lastUpdate":1413911103360,"startTime":1413911089959,"recentCrash
es":0},"global":{}}

With the time-based Backup everything is fine as well...
backup_data_timer_2014_10_21_19_05_50_0.tgm2:
TabGroupsManager:SaveData:version 2.0
Sleeping Groups:0
Closed Groups:0
Browser State:1
{"windows":[{"tabs":[{"entries":[{"url":"http://hmpg.net/","title":"End of the 
Internet","ID":2,"docshellID":5,"docIdentifier":2}],"lastAccessed":1413911150763
,"hidden":false,"attributes":{},"image":"http://hmpg.net/favicon.ico","extData":
{"TabGroupsManagerGroupId":"1","TabGroupsManagerGroupName":"Start"},"index":1}],
"selected":1,"_closedTabs":[],"busy":false,"width":"960","height":"579","screenX
":"4","screenY":"4","sizemode":"maximized"}],"selectedWindow":1,"_closedWindows"
:[],"session":{"lastUpdate":1413911150764,"startTime":1413911089959,"recentCrash
es":0},"global":{}}

As you close Firefox there is a following mistake though...
backup_data_window_close_2014_10_21_19_06_23_0.tgm2:
TabGroupsManager:SaveData:version 2.0
Sleeping Groups:0
Closed Groups:0
Browser State:1
{"windows":[],"selectedWindow":0,"_closedWindows":[{"tabs":[{"entries":[{"url":"
http://hmpg.net/","title":"End of the 
Internet","ID":2,"docshellID":5,"docIdentifier":2}],"lastAccessed":1413911183353
,"hidden":false,"attributes":{},"image":"http://hmpg.net/favicon.ico","extData":
{"TabGroupsManagerGroupId":"1","TabGroupsManagerGroupName":"Start"},"index":1}],
"selected":1,"_closedTabs":[],"width":"960","height":"579","screenX":"4","screen
Y":"4","sizemode":"maximized","extData":{"TabGroupsManagerAllGroupsData":"{\"gro
ups\":[{\"type\":\"TabGroupsManager:GroupData\",\"id\":1,\"name\":\"Start\",\"im
age\":\"\",\"disableAutoRename\":false,\"suspended\":false}]}"},"title":"End of 
the 
Internet","_shouldRestore":true,"closedAt":1413911183354}],"session":{"lastUpdat
e":1413911183526,"startTime":1413911089959,"recentCrashes":0},"global":{}}

This is the mistake ...
{"windows":[],"selectedWindow":0,"_closedWindows":[{

At this point "windows" is left empty and the current session is saved under 
"closedWindows".

This is why nothing is being restored, as you try to restore the backup.

Is this mistake well-known, comprehensible?

Original comment by DanielBY...@gmail.com on 30 Oct 2014 at 9:01

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Thank you so much Daniel, we will take a look at it.

Original comment by miguelro...@gmail.com on 30 Oct 2014 at 10:30

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Hi DanielBYoung71, I have been testing for session bugs, and took a look at 
your description, but havent been able to reproduce the bug in the lastest beta 
version 005. All session files seems to be saved with the right content, and 
all options seems to work fine. Please if you still find something wrong let us 
know. Thank you so much.

- Manually saving and restoring a session works.
- Timer session works and restoring from it also.
- Replaced session works.
- On firefox exit session works.

Original comment by miguelro...@gmail.com on 28 Dec 2014 at 9:38

[GoogleCodeExporter]

System Info:
What version of TabGroups Manager are you using?
Beta 105
What Operative System are you using? 32 or 64 bits?
Ubuntu 64-bit
What version of Firefox are you using?
FF 34.0.5

I'm still seeing one element of this problem with beta 105.  Suspended groups 
seem to save and restore properly on startup/shutdown, but if I use a manual 
restore from a saved TGM session that most definitely contains suspended 
groups, they do not appear, including loading from a "Session saved - on 
Firefox exit" TGM session that, when loaded automatically, did load the 
suspended tab groups.  Disabling the option per #18 had no effect on the 
problem.

I further tested this by exporting a large tab group (80 tabs), created a new 
firefox profile.  I imported the tab group and it appeared fine.  I exited and 
started and it appeared fine.  I suspended the group.  I exited and started and 
it appeared fine.  I then manually loaded the exact same session and it 
disappeared.

I don't know if it's related to this problem but I see many of these in the 
console (thrown in TabGroupsManager.js):

A promise chain failed to handle a rejection. Did you forget to '.catch', or 
did you forget to 'return'?
See 
https://developer.mozilla.org/Mozilla/JavaScript_code_modules/Promise.jsm/Promis
e

Date: Fri Jan 09 2015 18:36:56 GMT-0500 (EST)
Full Message: TypeError: tab.group is null

also a lot of these (thrown in SessionStore.jsm):

restore queue: hidden tab not found

Original comment by bitspring_gc@bitspring.com on 9 Jan 2015 at 11:48

[GoogleCodeExporter]

There is indeed a problem. Only the first manual load of a manual saved session 
show the suspended group. Every additional manual load of this session will 
hide the suspended group. This means also if you start with option start with 
restore last session and you have loaded this manual saved session again the 
group will disappear. To get this "hidden suspended" group back again we need 
to disable session restore in fx options and load the session manually. And 
voala the suspended group is back.

But i have no failure messages in this entire case.

It is true that we dont catch failure cases of promise. This occurs if tab 
object is not available within 2 seconds or so. But this is related to tab tabs 
and not to tabgroup tabs, so i suspect this has nothing to with this problem. 
But i wonder me why do you have this message and means that the object is not 
available in time. I have this problem not. Miguel do you have this promise 
error?(You need at least more as one group at startup)

The restore queue failure is known here. It happens because we send unnecessary 
events to sessionstore. It is easy to fix and have also nothing to do with the 
hidden suspended groups at 2nd load.

Original comment by micha.go...@arcor.de on 10 Jan 2015 at 2:34

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[deleted comment]

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I ran some more tests on a clean profile and indeed could not directly 
associate those errors with this issue.  (I deleted my previous post thinking I 
had some association, but further testing showed I was wrong.)

Anyways, I'm glad you are able to reproduce the problem I found.  Thank you.

Original comment by bitspring_gc@bitspring.com on 11 Jan 2015 at 6:04

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Yes. But us soon i have running the debugger this works as expected. Looks like 
we have a timing problem.

Original comment by micha.go...@arcor.de on 11 Jan 2015 at 8:11