How to restore the lost session?

mentat

I've lost a session of 120+ tabs, and I need them all back. Last Session and Last Tabs files in Default are filled with NULLs.
How can I restore? Might those links be stored elsewhere?

Pesala

@mentat Too late now, but learn about Saved Sessions

mentat

Thanks, I'll use that in future. But right now, maybe there is some encoded data on those links in temp files, or elsewhere? Or any hints to find them fast in history files?

stevenpemberton

@mentat I just reported this as a bug in Vivaldi. I got it too. It is too easy to lose a session, and too hard to retrieve it. History contains all the links, but not in a useful order for restoring the session, alas.

reb444

most other browsers offer a standard "session restore" or "start pages" (tab list essentially) automatically upon next login when their browser crashes, or upon computer shutdown...this is a very useful service...why or how Vivaldi doesn't, I don't know.

This is only one of the reasons I gravitate away from using V. All it is, is a mere extension of GoOgles Chrome. Too bad.

BoneTone

@reb444 said in How to restore the lost session?:

"session restore" or "start pages" (tab list essentially) automatically upon next login when their browser crashes, or upon computer shutdown...this is a very useful service...why or how Vivaldi doesn't, I don't know.

Vivaldi does have session restore. It's right there in the first settings page...

Using the "Last Session" option will restore your session when you restart the browser. If you close your windows one by one, instead of using the "Exit" command, then it will only restore the last window that you close, as it should but some people don't realize that closing windows before exiting removes that window from the current session. Of course this behavior is correct, otherwise all your windows ever would be restored. If you want multiple windows to be kept as the current session, just use the Exit command.

This will also restore the session when the browser crashes (usually) or you kill the process with a task manager. In that case, it should restore all windows, just like an exit command, as all those windows were part of the current session when the program was terminated.

The trash can holds the last 25 "items". If you close tabs, it will hold tabs. If you close a window, that window will be in the trash can, so potentially more than 25 tabs will be recoverable.

@mentat said in How to restore the lost session?:

in future

I recommend using the AutoSave Session Mod. It will automatically save your session's state every X minutes and keep the last Y autosaved sessions, two independent variables you can configure. I have mine set to 20 minutes and 10 sessions. This means that in the event of an error I can restore my state as it was at most 19 minutes ago, and have snapshots of my state going back at least 3 hours.

This helps protect you against various errors that can result in the loss of tabs, like closing a bunch of tabs accidentally. It's one of my favorite mods, and when combined with the mod below together they turn saved sessions from what was a minor feature for me into a critical part of my workflow.

Advanced Panels Mod with Sessions Panel isn't directly related to recovering mistakenly lost state, but it is a great way to create, manage & access saved sessions. It is far superior to the native UI for saved sessions in my opinion. The mod actually enables you to create your own advanced panels, but it comes with the sessions panel as an example. Now that I have installed this, I used saved sessions instead of cluttering my bookmarks library with temporary bookmarks just to pick up where I left off on some line of work. I'll move all the relevant tabs to a new window (unless the window has only tabs I want to save), then create a saved session from only that window & close it. I can restore that session whenever I want to pick it up again, and at that time save any pages as bookmarks if I desire.

@mentat said in How to restore the lost session?:

Last Session and Last Tabs files in Default are filled with NULLs.
How can I restore? Might those links be stored elsewhere?

If Last Session & Current Session don't have your tabs, then you're best bet is to just restore them from your history within the Vivaldi app. Depending on your operating system, and your settings within it, it's possible that those files have prior versions backed up by the system, and you can look into restoring that if it exists.

Edit: Oops, I didn't realize this was a necrobump by a first time poster. Oh well, I took the time to write it, I'll let it stand as it may help others in the future. I'm sure the OP has long since moved on.