Extra Bookmarks Generated in Chromium Browsers

[balthanon]

Which version of floccus are you using?

5.8.6

How many bookmarks do you have, roughly?

3000 (and 6000)

Are you using other means to sync bookmarks in parallel to floccus?

No

Sync method

Google Drive

Which browser are you using? In case you are using the phone App, specify the Android or iOS version and device please.

Chrome 146.0.7680.155 (Official Build) (64-bit) and Firefox 149.0 (64-bit)

Which version of Nextcloud Bookmarks are you using? (if relevant)

No response

Which version of Nextcloud? (if relevant)

No response

What kind of WebDAV server are you using? (if relevant)

No response

Describe the Bug

A few weeks to a month ago, I noticed that my Chromium browsers stopped syncing because it would have deleted 50% of my bookmarks, while Firefox ones were doing fine. I've been lazy and haven't looked into it until just now, but when I checked, my Chromium bookmarks had more than doubled.

I did a compare between the two bookmark files and ended up finding the culprit fairly quickly-- it was some blank bookmarks that I set up in place of or just above separators that I had set up in Firefox a long time ago. Typically Chrome has ignored separators when importing from Firefox backups, but I somehow had ~2800 of the bookmarks that replaced them in the one folder where they were present.

I assume that is because of a loop that happened at some point that was somehow cut off, but it's possible something else caused it as well. Oddly, the separators are now gone in Firefox and when I deleted the 2800 bookmarks the sync processed again fine in Chrome too. (Which I expected, since the failsafe would no longer trigger once the number of bookmarks lined up.)

<DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1528389344">==[Humor]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768873392">==[Humor]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1528389344">==[Incidental]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1528389344">==[Romance]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1528389344">==[Serious - Angst]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768874362">==[Humor]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768873392">==[Incidental]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768873392">==[Romance]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768873392">==[Serious - Angst]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768875294">==[Humor]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768874362">==[Incidental]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768874362">==[Romance]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768874362">==[Serious - Angst]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768876202">==[Humor]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768875294">==[Incidental]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768875294">==[Romance]==</A> <DT><A HREF="about:blank" ADD_DATE="1768875294">==[Serious - Angst]==</A>
An example of the separators in an exported bookmark file are above-- I'm not sure if it is the separators in combination with the bookmarks that caused issues here or something with the naming convention I used with the ==[ ]== brackets.

I'm actually traveling at the moment, so I'll do a bit more testing once I get back and validate on other browsers where the issue was occurring and see if I can replicate this. A quick test with a single example didn't trigger any unusual behavior. I wanted to report it for now though and see if it triggered any obvious "ahh, yeah, that would cause issues" insights.

Expected Behavior

Bookmarks shouldn't be replicated, particularly by the thousands.

To Reproduce

Haven't been able to replicate the behavior yet, I will try and set up more test cases when I get back next week. If I can't duplicate it, I'll just close the issue as a one off that possibly occurred on a previous version of Floccus.

Logs don't actually show any issues either, nothing now after resolving it and I'm fairly sure nothing when I first noticed the issue.

Debug log provided

• I have provided a debug log file

[github-actions]

Hello! 👋

Thank you for taking the time to open this issue with floccus. I know it's frustrating when software causes problems. You have made the right choice to come here and open an issue to make sure your problem gets looked at and if possible solved. Let me give you a short introduction on what to expect from this issue tracker to avoid misunderstandings. I'm Marcel. I created floccus a few years ago, and have been maintaining it since. I currently work for Nextcloud which leaves me with less time for side projects like this one than I used to have. I still try to answer all issues and if possible fix all bugs here, but it sometimes takes a while until I get to it. Until then, please be patient. It helps when you stick around to answer follow up questions I may have, as very few bugs can be fixed directly from the first bug report, without any interaction. If information is missing in your bug report and the issue cannot be solved without it, I will have to close the issue after a while. Note also that GitHub in general is a place where people meet to make software better together. Nobody here is under any obligation to help you, solve your problems or deliver on any expectations or demands you may have, but if enough people come together we can collaborate to make this software better. For everyone. Thus, if you can, you could also have a look at other issues to see whether you can help other people with your knowledge and experience. If you have coding experience it would also be awesome if you could step up to dive into the code and try to fix the odd bug yourself. Everyone will be thankful for extra helping hands! If you cannot lend a helping hand, to continue the development and maintenance of this project in a sustainable way, I ask that you donate to the project when opening an issue (or at least once your issue is solved), if you're not a donor already. You can find donation options at https://floccus.org/donate/. Thank you!

One last word: If you feel, at any point, like you need to vent, this is not the place for it; you can go to the Nextcloud forum, to twitter or somewhere else. But this is a technical issue tracker, so please make sure to focus on the tech and keep your opinions to yourself.

Thank you for reading through this primer. I look forward to working with you on this issue! Cheers! 💙

[marcelklehr]

Hey @balthanon
Thank you for raising this! I think I may have an idea what causes this.