Icons in Tabs Lost after Firefox's Latest Update

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Hi all, :waving_hand:

yesterday I updated my system (Linux Lite) and accordingly a firefox update was applied as well.
Now my firefox version is 140.0.4.

Strangely all tab icons have disappeared after the update. :astonished_face:

That is in bookmarks as well as in history. The tabs just show a generic icon which is the same for all tabs:

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There´s just some sort of “globe” icon to be seen.

However: if a tab is opened, i.e. a connection to the respective site is established, the icon changes to what is was before…
… at least in most cases (but not always):

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In the example screenshot I opened all of the 5 tabs depicted but only the first 3 ones updated their icons. :thinking:

Did anyone of you experience the same behaviour of firefox after the update to version 140.0.4 :red_question_mark:

I´m not very pleased with the situation.
I´ve no idea whether this is just in Linux disros or if it´s a general change in behaviour.

Many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I don’t use now Firefox, but I’m confident those icons are fetched from the sites you open, the favicon.
I can imagine the recent FF update changed the storage of the favicons, hence they were cleared, and vanished. Now I opened Firefox (128.12 ESR) and my favicons were missing too. As I opened the bookmarked links, they got back.
Maybe the site you have bookmarked had the favicon before, but does not now?
Can you provide an exact link to what does not look nice?
E.G. buy a raspberry…

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Hi LĂĄszlĂł, :waving_hand:

thanks a lot for your very quick reply. :heart:

Yes, I guess so.

I see. That might be an explanation.

Right. So the behaviour of your firefox version is the same as mine.

You mean the links to the 2 sites that didn´t refresh the favicon in spite of being clicked on, right?

Here they are:

Thanks again and many greetings from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I bookmarked them, and got the right favicons.
So sadly I have no idea what the problem could be…
What if you remove those links, and re-bookmark them?

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Hi LĂĄszlĂł, :waving_hand:

thanks for trying it out yourself.

Yes, this works just fine. I just tried it.

Considering the number of bookmarks I have, I´m afraid that wouldn´t be the way to go for me though.

Hmm, I was wondering if the following would work:

Refreshing the GTK icon cache. :thinking:

/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/gdk-pixbuf-2.0/gdk-pixbuf-query-loaders --update-cache

I looked up the man pages:

man gdk-pixbuf-query-loaders
[...]

OPTIONS
       --update-cache
           Write the output to the default cache location instead of stdout
[...]

I found a hint to it here:

https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/636953/firefox-window-icon-disappeared-after-interrupted-upgrade .

I´m not sure it´ll work with my problem though.

What do you think: any harm in trying it out :red_question_mark:

Cheers from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I don’t see how it could harm, but in any doubt, create a system snapshot.
Timeshift or Systemback…
If anything goes worng, just restore.

Edit::
This may be useful to you:
https://superuser.com/questions/1787899/is-there-a-way-to-refresh-the-favicons-of-all-tabs-in-firefox

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I had this issue now and then, but I had no clue what caused it.

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Hi again, :waving_hand:

@kovacslt :

Right. Thanks for the advice. A timeshift snapshot will be due in 2 days anyway. Good point. :+1:

Thanks also for the links, LĂĄszlĂł.

@abu :

Me neither.
My research led me to the following possible causes:

  1. userChrome.css conflicts
  2. Corrupted icon cache or GTK icon issues
  3. Desktop entry or icon path issues

I guess 3. doesn´t apply here.
2. might be more like it.

Many greetings to all from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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It wouldn’t be too bad if you exported your bookmarks to a file. I believe that ends up in an html file. Then you could open that and just middle click on each link to open it in a new tab. Lots of clicking, but not impossible.

Good luck.

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Can anyone explain to me what a favicon is?

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When you open a web page its the small image that appears in the top left corner of the tab, so the one for its foss looks like 3 head and shoulders. Mine on my web site looks like a computer screen.

Usually its a logo that represents a brand such as ford, macdonalds etc.

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I think FF does this automatically; see folder bookmarkbackups within your profile.
You can step down your bookmark history at any time.

There are addons for that.

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I think the cache or the preload was cleared during the update, this is what happens to my Epiphany too. It’s where the browser stores favicons for faster loads.

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Hi again, :waving_hand:

thank you all for your replies. :heart:

@pdecker:

Actually I do this on an irregular basis, so that I have backups of my bookmarks. Haven´t done it in a while though.

Yes, opening any bookmarked site gives me the favicon back. But the site has to be loaded first.
Thanks for your suggestion.

@nevj:

I didn´t know the exact term of the small icon on the left side of the tab either. Now I learned something new. :wink:

Thanks @callpaul.eu for the explanation. :+1:

@abu:

Thanks for providing the link. I´ll look it up.

@George1:

Thanks. This seems to be the most logical explanation.
Curious though that previous firefox updates didn´t trigger this behaviour.
Perhaps they changed how it works under the hood.

Many thanks to all of you.

Cheers from Rosika :slightly_smiling_face:

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I think browsers request favicon.ico automatically, even if it doesn’t exist. We see lots of those in the logs for our websites. It’s an annoyance to see a 404 in the logs, so I create a favicon.ico file sometimes.

I created an index.html file in my Downloads folder and ran a quick web server using Python. It shows a request for favicon.ico even though the entire contents of index.html is “Hello”.

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I learned what it was when I created my own website. The backend stuff I had to do was a whole new learning stretch. Then I had to create the favicon in a graphics app and upload that small image file to my website so that it would display for each site visitor. It is also like a logo that confirms visually that you are on the “real” site.

Look at the tab for It’sFoss Community: next to it is a square speech bubble with people outlines inside. That is a favicon. That icon adds credibility and like other icons of well known entities, it becomes a “branding” for that site.

Sheila

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If you view the source of any web page it has a link to a favicon, part of the google site checking is to look for it, along with key words and description

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Thanks. It does not show in ddg browser in Android, because ddg’s tabs are on a separate page.
I tried Samsung internet browser and found it.

I will have a look when I get back to the PC. I have been sick for a few days.

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Hope your feeling better now

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