Moving your firefox profile after a clean install of Windows 10

After the awesome flawless upgrade to Windows 10, and knowing that I can now do a clean install and still have windows 10 activate afforded the re-install.

However an excellent question to ask is 'moving your firefox profile after a clean install of Windows 10'. You want all your extensions, bookmarks etc to come over, not just your bookmarks.

Hunting on the internet didn't yield much. Most options revolved around exporting the JSON file for your book marks. This information probably does exist somewhere but here it is anyway.

First go to the drive your windows is sitting on (Windows 7 and up). Head to <your windows system drive>:\Users\<your user>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles
You will see a cryptic looking folder inside looking something like z8h0c3kh.default
Make a backup of that folder. The cryptic looking name will be important later on.

Perform a clean install of Windows 10, then install Mozilla Firefox. Run Firefox at least once and exit.

Go to the same folder as above: <your windows system drive>:\Users\<your user>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles

Copy the backup you made earlier into that folder.

Now go back one level so you are at: <your windows system drive>:\Users\<your user>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\
Edit the file "profiles.ini" in that folder.
It should look like :

[General]
StartWithLastProfile=1

[Profile0]
Name=default
IsRelative=1
Path=Profiles/d9jf63k8.default
Default=1

 Change the line "Path=Profiles/d9jf63k8.default" to "Path=Profiles/z8h0c3kh.default"
In the above example, replace the cryptic looking name I have here with the one on your folder from earlier.

Now if you load Firefox everything should be there. Your bookmarks AND extensions, plugins, themes.

It will be as if Firefox was never un-installed, all the while enjoying your CLEAN install of Windows 10!

Windows done right

Ahhhh, local account on Windows 10, Finally!

I didn't like windows 8 and 8.x's idea of "logging to the netz" method of logging to get full benefit. You could create a local account there though but windows 10 has a lot less restrictions, and apps downloaded will work without signing in. I now have two accounts. One local for most of my stuff, and one connected for the "rest of the stuff". I like this harmony and it works for me; I will use my local more than the connected.

I digress now, my windows digression.

Also after much study on how my windows systems behaved from windows 7 on wards and with prior experience with Windows XP and down, I found something interesting.

I am a gamer, yes I am, I love games, I love the artistic expressions in games, I love the technology and the intrigue. I LOVE DEVELOPING THEM.

So I am naturally going to look for the best gaming experience and I have done so since 1995. In the "good ol' DOS" days I created a config.sys and autoexec.bat combination with menu to select which "mode" I wanted the computer to boot in. Windows 3.1 would load in the "normal" option where as games would load in a different mode and of course would not launch windows 3.1. Wow back in those days it was inconceivable to run big games from windows 3.1.

Transporting to windows 95 and "boot into dos" was used, along with its hardware profile settings for windows based games. Come windows 2k (eew 98, eeww ME, never got those!) it was time for dual booting. So the dual boot menu selected from Linux, Windows Main and Windows Game. Windows XP pro, same thing. Windows 7 pro Same thing (eeww Vista! never got past the technical preview). However in windows 7 pro I noticed something different. Previously I had to re-install windows to get it stable after using it for some time, and to make it work quicker. Windows 7 suffered less so of this problem. Infact after a while I began installing games on Windows 7 Main and comparing it to the Game boot version. No matter how much I used windows 7 main and installed stuff, I was not getting a frame hit difference. It seemed to be much better behaved than previous versions.

Ultimately windows 7 professional became the last windows OS to have multiple copies installed on the same computer, which could be used only one at a time. With windows 10, there will be one instance, and as always, on a separate drive dedicated for OS's only. Finally I can say, going from windows 3.1 up, that you can run games in windows proper. I do not envision needing a reformat, or another boot just for games in windows 10. Too early to say "Windows done right"? Perhaps, but given my experience with OS's for over 20 years from old BBC computers, Amiga's, Linux, DOS, Windows, I am confident that this time, it is going to be how I think it is going to be...Windows done right.