Clearing history from Firefox address bar

**munruben** · 16th December 2008, 11:54 AM

Firefox have not provided a fix for this as yet and trying to clear the drop down history from the address bar is frustrating for some to say the least. You can go to the trouble to delete each one in turn and they will appear to be gone but on re-opening Firefox, they will be back.

There will be some of you out there who do not want the address bar to save your visited website. Not me of course, got nothing to hide

However, so as to keep my address bar neat and tidy I must admit I have deleted the websites and places I have visited from it.

There are actually a couple of ways it can be done. First method you can do it by typing "about:config" in your address bar, without the quotation marks of course.. Make sure you type the colon between about and config. Hit Enter.
Click on I promise to be careful in the box that comes up. scroll down to "browser ".urlbar. MaxRichResults" double click on this line and change the value to "0" (zero) default is 12.
The above will stop future history being saved in your address bar...BUT bear in mind that if you change the value back to default 12. all your previous history will be back. This method is not good enough if you want to clear them competely from your computer.

SO you say I want to delete it permenently not just hide it. well no worries, it can be done quite simply. Here's how.. Second method.

Go to C:\Documents and settings\your user name\Application datta\ Mozilla\Firefox\Profile\ewyjor7 (this folder name (the last one that is in blue) will be different on your computer but will be similar and obvious) Open that file by double cliking on it and look for a file called "places.squite" Simply delete this file by right clicking on it and hit delete.

Note: if you dont see the Application Data folder when you open username.. simply click on "Tools" from the tools bar at the top of your screen and click "Folder Options" click on the "view" tab and put a dot in "show hidden files and folders" You will now be able to see the "Application Datta" folder.

Make sure that you only delete the file "places.squite" there is a similar one called "places. squite library" Don't delete that one. just delete "places,squite"
Sounds complicated but its not.

When you have finished, the address bar may contain just one entry but all the others will be gone and will not keep a history in the address bar in future.
You only have to use one of the methods above depending on how you want to do it.

**blackhole** · 16th December 2008, 11:59 AM

preferences

privacy

private data
settings

**Geoff Dean** · 16th December 2008, 12:22 PM

And this is what the tabs look like:

**munruben** · 16th December 2008, 12:25 PM

Correct, but that will also clear your history folder. The fix I mentioned above will still leave your history folder intact but will clear the address bar history. Firefox have not yet come up with a solution to clear just the address bar history.

**munruben** · 16th December 2008, 12:34 PM

Maybe I should make that a bit clearer.

The fix I mentioned will leave the History folder intact in the sense that it will still keep a history of where you will visit but the address bar will not. This means that when you type in the beginning of a word in the address bar, you will no longer get a list of names drop down showing where you have been but you will still have a history of your websites if you still desire.. Of course, if you dont want to keep history then you can do what you suggest.

**wheelinround** · 17th December 2008, 07:37 AM

I don't have the problem Firefox clears mine ok

**munruben** · 18th December 2008, 05:08 PM

Originally Posted by wheelinround

I don't have the problem Firefox clears mine ok

Yep it will but as stated above, will clear both your history and your address bar history, This method will ensure that your address bar will not keep a history of sites visited in future.

**KevM** · 18th December 2008, 07:16 PM

Try this

Drag your cursor onto the "offending" site in your address bar after typing the first letter or so, this will then highlight the address, then hit the delete key.

Seems to be pretty simple but it appears to work.

**prozac** · 18th December 2008, 11:56 PM

Can you set up your preference by going "Tools", then "Options", then selecting "Privacy", and choosing one or all of the choices there? Not telling, I'm asking.

**munruben** · 20th December 2008, 02:12 PM

Originally Posted by prozac

Can you set up your preference by going "Tools", then "Options", then selecting "Privacy", and choosing one or all of the choices there? Not telling, I'm asking.

Sorry prozo, only just seen your post. No, if you do this in preferences apparently it clears your main history folder and the address bar as well and then when you start visiting websites in future it will create another list in your addfress bar (now called location bar) so eventually you will be back where you started.
The method I described is to still keep history of sites you visit but to stop Firefox recording them in your address bar. So when you typ in an address, old websites visited will not show up in the drop down box that usually drops down. Firefox will no longer use this function if you delete the folder as described above but will still keep history as you have configured in preferences.

**blackhole** · 29th December 2008, 09:29 AM

The default number of results that is shown when a user types in a phrase in the Firefox 3 location bar is 12 which might seem a bit like an overkill to many users. It’s actually very easy to change that amount and either reduce it to a more appropriate number or even increase it if you prefer even more recommendations.

And users who do not like the feature at all can even disable it completely. The number of recommendations is defined by the parameter browser.urlbar.maxRichResults which can be set by typing in about:config in the Firefox 3 location bar. A double-click on that entry makes it possible to edit that number.

The recommendations would be completely disabled by entering the number -1 while any other positive number would set it to that value. A restart of Firefox is required before the changes will take effect.

**rednihilist** · 17th June 2009, 03:10 PM

Do you have the same information available for deleting the autocomplete (?) in Windows Vista? I can't find anything that will get me close to getting rid of all the address bar history, and I'd appreciate any tips or help. . . ?

Thanks in advance.

**blackhole** · 17th June 2009, 08:48 PM

do the same thing but this time set

Toolkit.autocomplete.richBoundaryCutoff

to -1

**punkahknight** · 18th June 2009, 10:17 PM

When I last used Firefox, this is the info received. I subscribed to the weekly newsletter also:
http://ask-leo.com/how_do_i_clear_my...n_firefox.html

Reggie

**mickelmaster** · 19th June 2009, 08:15 AM

Tools - Clear Private Data, the problem with this is that you delete all of them not just the particular ones, if you want you can delete you cookies too, but then you have to type in you username and password into this forum again

I do it every month or so so it doesnt come up with a massive list when im typing in a site address.

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