Recover Safari browsing history from May using Time Machine on Mac

Restoring the History.db SQLite3 databases from Time Machine will overwrite existing files, if that matters.

I wrote a short Zsh script that generates a CSV based on the history found in separate tables within History.db. If you select that written CSV on your Desktop after the script runs, you can use Apple's QuickLook (spacebar) to see a convenient tabular view of your history by date, title, and link. Where titles are not found, Unavailable will be substituted.

Source:

--------

#!/bin/zsh

: <<'COMMENT'
Generate a CSV document with headers showing current Safari History
database content. You can view the columnar CSV in a scrollable QuickLook window,
or load it into a spreadsheet

Reference: http://2016.padjo.org/tutorials/sqlite-your-browser-history/

Usage in Terminal:
./sql_dtu.zsh > ~/Desktop/hist.csv

VikingOSX, 2020-07-16, Apple Support Communities, No warranties expressed or implied.
COMMENT

sqlite3 -header -csv $HOME/Library/Safari/History.db \
"SELECT DISTINCT
    datetime(visit_time + 978307200, 'unixepoch', 'localtime') AS visit_time,
    coalesce(nullif(title,''), 'Unavailable') as title, url
FROM
    history_visits
INNER JOIN
    history_items ON
        history_items.id = history_visits.history_item;"
exit 0

Save this script on your Desktop as sql_dtu.zsh. Launch the Terminal application and enter the following:

cd ~/Desktop
chmod +x ./sql_dtu.zsh
./sql_dtu.zsh > ~/Desktop/hist.csv

Now, you can quit the Terminal, select hist.csv on your Desktop, and just press the space bar to view it.

First quit Safari. Then open Finder and go to ~/Library/Safari (the “~” is important). Enter Time Machine and restore the following files:

• History.db
• History.db-shm
• History.db-wal