Saving Private Messages & Trading Feedback with Firefox & Scrapbook

[Silver Smurfer]

If you use Firefox and you're looking to save your private messages & trading feedback this guide is for you.
If you use some other browser, well... don't come following me!

Requirements

• Firefox browser[/*]
• Scrapbook plugin[/*]

[h]1. Preparation[/h]

A: Plugin Local Storage
By default, Scrapbook will store all local copies of web page data under:

• Windows: %AppData%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\{random-string}.default\ [/*]
• Mac: Users/<username>/Library/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/{random-string}.default/ [/*]
• Linux: /home/<username>/.mozilla/firefox/{random-string}.default/ [/*]

- this is fine, except if the profile becomes corrupt or your delete it for some reason, you will lose you saved Feedback & PM's. Plus, if you already have a folder where you keep SS materials why not put it in a folder there instead?

1. Open the Firefox menu[/*]
2. Click Add-ons[/*]
3. Locate Scrapbook & click Options[/*]
4. In the Organize tab click Save data to radio button and click Browse... to find the folder you want to use
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_21.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   [/*]

B: Managing Folders (Optional)
If you have a lot of PM's spanning many pages you may want to do some preparation by organising them into folders of month-per-year, named liked YYYY-MM. This will help with saving the messages because new messages push older ones into pages that didn't exist before, and keeping them all current would require re-saving PM's starting at Page N=last & working your way back to Page N=1st.

1. Log in & go to Messages[/*]
2. At the bottom of the page click Manage folders[/*]
3. Type a name for the new folder you want to create & click Add New
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_11.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   You can rename folders with Edit & reorder them by typing a number for the ascending order & clicking Update positions
   [/*]
4. Return to your Inbox and go to the last page of PM's[/*]
5. At the bottom of the page click Move multiple messages[/*]
6. Tick the boxes of all messages that you want to move, if all the messages are for the same month click All
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_12.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   [/*]
7. Select the folder you want to move them to & click Move
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_13.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   [/*]
8. Rinse, repeat.[/*]

[h]2. Downloading PM's & Feedback[/h]
Now comes the easy bit.

1. Choose a page of PM's or Feedback to download[/*]
2. Click & drag to select all the elements you wish to save, I recommend including the heading that states which folder/page you're on for your own convenience, it will be used as the name of the local store and it's inclusion in the page data will help with identification purposes later
   Why do this, why not just save the whole page? Because the page contains a hyperlink to logout and this will break the download function before it's finished, leaving you with a collection of "You're not currently logged in" pages
   [/*]
3. Now right-click and from the popup menu choose Save Selection As...
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_22.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   [/*]
4. Ensure the title is correct and for Depth to follow links click 1
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_23.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   [/*]
5. Finally, click Save and sit back to watch the magic happen
   [imgz=http://forums.silverstackers.com/uploads/26760_24.png]
   
   [/imgz]
   [/*]
6. Rinse, repeat.
   Pay close attention that you don't miss visiting & saving Page 2 or Page 3 of any folders that had too much content for one page!
   And don't forget it works for Feedback too
   [/*]

You will eventually end up with a list of locally stored pages, organised according to the folder and naming convention you setup earlier.

Note Bene:
Each main page and collection of sub-pages saved by Scrapbook will have their links remapped to the local storage, meaning that you can follow a link from a folder to a specific Private Message while offline, after Ye Olde SS FluxBB has sunk, under the influence of Smurfberry Wine, etc et al. Yay.
Be aware though that on the sub-page all links will still point to their original targets, wherever that is/was.
However you can navigate the tree in Scrapbook to find a folder listing all the PM's it contained, and you can click a link to load that PM. Insert more yay <here>.