Why do I have a random icon when I search for something?

Sweetoonz

At some point in the last week or so, when I search using the address bar, the logo for one of our supermarkets pops up. Why, and where do I go to delete this from the system?

I'm using Version 7.2.3621.67 (Stable channel) for Windows 10 desktop.

Sweetoonz

Just noting that I've cleared cookies and cache for a different trouble shooting problem, and the bloody icon still pops up. I don't even like this supermarket, so it is really annoying!

Pathduck

@Sweetoonz Looks like a broken favicon cache. No idea why it would happen, but a fix would be:

Find Profile Path in Help > About
Close browser
Find file Favicons in profile path and delete it
Start browser

Unfortunately, this will also nuke all other favicons and will need to be regenerated by visiting the sites again.

Sweetoonz

@Pathduck Thanks - I found two different versions of the Favicons (had to search for them as they were buried in the Vivaldi folders). Deleting them on their own didn't work, but also clearing my entire browser history did. Now Vivaldi has picked up the GoogleMaps icon instead - close but no cigar (and no, I didn't visit GoogleMaps beforehand - the first thing I did was search!) I can live with this one, though...

Interestingly, the icon in question wasn't included in either favicon folder, so not entirely sure where Vivaldi was looking...

Pathduck

@Sweetoonz I told you to find the Favicons file in the profile folder you find from Help > About. Not search for it.

So I have no idea what file/folder you deleted or if you deleted something important you shouldn't have.

Sweetoonz

There was no favicons folder in that pathway. So nothing there for me to delete!
So I searched the Vivaldi folders for "favicon" - therefore only deleted stuff within the Vivaldi files. It was buried in a different pathway, still within the Vivaldi area.

Pathduck

@Sweetoonz in Help > About I have:
Profile Path C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Vivaldi\User Data\Default

In that location I have:

Were those the files you deleted?

WildEnte

@Pathduck I also noticed this issue today, my search engine uses the TÜV favicon. I also don't have favicon folders in my profile folder...

Pathduck

@WildEnte said in Why do I have a random icon when I search for something?:

I also don't have favicon folders in my profile folder...

It's not a folder, it's two files named:
Favicons
Favicons-journal
Only the Favicons file needs to be deleted.

It would be really strange if these were missing as they are standard in all Chromium browsers, required for favicons to show at all, and will be created on startup if missing. Are you sure you're looking in the correct place?

WildEnte

@Pathduck said in Why do I have a random icon when I search for something?:

It's not a folder, it's two files named

Ok, doh. Without a file extension, windows user that I am thinks it has to be a folder
Deleted the file, now let's see

Pathduck

@WildEnte Folders always have a folder icon

I'm not actually sure how relevant the Favicons file is, as search engines are defined in the Web Data file and it has a url for the favicon there:

$ sqlite3 "Web Data" "select short_name,favicon_url from keywords;"
Bing|https://www.bing.com/sa/simg/bing_p_rr_teal_min.ico
Yahoo!|https://no.search.yahoo.com/favicon.ico
DuckDuckGo|https://duckduckgo.com/favicon.ico
Ecosia|https://cdn-static.ecosia.org/static/icons/favicon.ico
Startpage|https://www.startpage.com/sp/cdn/favicons/favicon--default.ico
Wikipedia|https://no.wikipedia.org/static/favicon/wikipedia.ico
Google|https://www.google.com/favicon.ico

If it doesn't work, look in the Settings > Search list what the icon is.
Try resetting search engines to default.
Worst case, you could delete the Web Data file, this will nuke and reset all your search engines obviously but might fix the problem, and if you have no custom engines it's no problem doing that.

Sweetoonz

@Pathduck - Doh - I, too, though that it had to be a folder, not a file - with the files I'm used to having some form of extension (.bak, doc etc...) Sorry - PEBCAK issue there!

Fortunately, deleting the two favicons folders doesn't seem to have broken Vivaldi - I've been using it absolutely fine, and really easy to right click / restore the files from my recycle bin...

Deleting the file now and seeing what that does.

Hadden89

@Pathduck unsure too, as it works here(tm) out of the box. But there must be a common factor: I've read for this specific issue at least for three times in last week. (A ~~no solution~~ workaround is also to disable the omnibar, it seems)

WildEnte

Fun fact: the issue was fixed after I had deleted the favicon file, and now it's back (on my work computer, windows 11). So...

I'm not the only one
the issue comes back once fixed.

I have the super vague feeling this is connected to the address bar updates.
Any suggestions about how to narrow this down?

ourostra

Has anyone already reported this problem as a bug?