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how do I delete my iCloud bookmarks and upload a new bookmark file

While managing my bookmarks, I deleted a bookmarks folder in my bookmarks bar. Just then the infamous beachball started and a dialog popped up saying my bookmarks were syncing with iCloud. Then Safari crashed. After opening it, all my bookmarks bar bookmarks were gone. Thankfully, I had a backup of the bookmarks, however, I don't want to merge with the bookmarks on iCloud, fearing they're screwed up. How do I delete or overwrite my iCloud bookmarks and upload my new corrected version?

MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.1), iDVD on Applications Install DVD

Posted on Oct 20, 2011 11:22 AM

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81 replies

Oct 31, 2011 3:36 PM in response to Andrew White2

Good luck with that! I had a similar experience and no avail. iCloud has created a MESS of horrendous proportions with my Safari bookmarks in my iPhone, iPad, MBP and iMac. The only sane way that was able to workout was to turn Bookmarks off and just sync with my main machine (iMac after re-importing from a clean backup my bookmarks back into my machine). Now when I sync all my iOS devices and iMac are OK except my MBP that will not of course sync with my iMac. Not 100% but 10,000 BETTER than the Bookmarks iCloud mess. Everything else for me from iCloud works OK. But so far no words from Apple about iCloud issues... yet.


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Nov 4, 2011 7:14 AM in response to bradenpc

Me too. I've got over 38,000 bookmark entries (should realistically be about 200) where iCloud has synced incorrectly. Having deleted bookmarks across all my devices except one, deleted all the duplicates etc and then re-enabled syncing I'm back at 38000 entries again. It seems impossible to delete the iCloud records. Can Apple support delete iCloud data?

Nov 18, 2011 1:22 PM in response to Orsky

I had problems syncing bookmarks on an IMac, a MBP an iPhone 4 and an iPad 1.

After reading all the good hints I gave it a thought an honestly fixed it in 5 minutes so far.


Make sure you have latest OSX and iOS software on your devices.


I switched of sync on the MBP and cleaned the bookmarks. After that I disables sync on the iPhone and iPad and agreed to delete all bookmarks when I was asked. I checked on the devices in Safari whether all bookmarks were deleted and found a few being still there which I manually deleted.


Then I deleted ALL bookmarks on the iMac and waited until it has synced to iCloud. after that I disabled syncing on the iMAC.


On the MBP with the cleaned bookmarks I enabled syncing again and agreed to merge these bookmarks in iCloud which was flushed by the iMac.


After the MBP had uploaded I enabled syncing on all devices and now all devices show the same bookmarks.


Deleted and added some and all devices still are up-to-date.


Hope this helps someone

Nov 18, 2011 1:32 PM in response to joey66

Spinds vers interesting what you did.


Can you please tell a bit more about excatly how you "cleaned the bookmarks" MBP?


I have around 18.000 bookmarks thai needs to get deleted, and the only possible way for me right now, is to delete them one by one...


This will take me about 10 years to complete, so I raelly need another way of deleting my bookmarks...

Nov 19, 2011 7:41 AM in response to Andrew White2

This took me a alot of playing around to get things working correctly. I was having the exact same duplication issues everyone else was having. Here's how I managed to get things working correctly.


1. Turn off bookmark syncing on every single OS X and iOS 5 device you own.

2. Select a "master" computer where you can clean up your bookmarks. Export your current bookmarks to play it safe.

3. Now clean up your bookmarks so they are setup exactly how you want them. While you're doing this make sure you deleted every single "folder" listed in the bookmarks pane on the left side of the browser window. The actual book marks that are displayed are the ones listed under the "collections" line. The blue extras being sync from iCloud.

4. Exported the "clean" bookmarks.

5. Turn on iCloud bookmarks syncing and agree to the merge.

6. Go to every other OS X and iOS device and delete bookmark on all these devices.

7. By now the only thing on iCloud will be the cleaned up bookmarks from the "master" computer. Turn on iCloud bookmarks syncing on one of your devices and wait for the bookmarks to sync.

8. Once you know that the second device has synced correctly (it will if you deleted all the extra stuff as directed) then try your next device and continue with all your remaining devices.


This will work as you expect it to as long as you clean EVERYTHING out of the folder collections from the "master" computer. From this point forward things will sync nicely.


Hope this helps!

Nov 20, 2011 10:44 AM in response to Denny Powell

Done that and still DOES NOT work for me! I wiped out my bookmarks in ALL my devices (iPhone 4, iPad 2, MBP, and iMac). Of course, I made backups of my bookmars prior of wiping it out and proceeded to wait 4 days to make sure iCloud had enough time to clear itself up alright. After seeing that I didn't get no more entries synched to any of my devices I proceeded to restore my bookmarks first to my iMac. Then I waited and yes, a few minutes later it synch correctly into my MBP however, when it came to my iOS devices it came over alright except it came over with dupplicates AGAIN!!!! So, at this point I just went and clean up all those entries from my iPhone and iPad. Luckily they stayed like that and no further dupplicates were created.


Now, because I don't feel iCloud is working correctly, at least for me, with my Safari Bookmarks and Notes, I have left those two apps untoched. But this week I added a new bookmark into a folder from my iPhone 4... well, guess what? The new bookmark after 3 days NEVER showed up in my other devices! Once again, I proceeded to remove that entry from my iPhone 4 and added it from my iPad 2... SAME results. Ok... the frustration continues... I removed the bookmark from my iPad and added it from my iMac and guess what happen next? The new bookmark showed up in my MBP!!!! It didn't show up in the same location as I placed it from my iMac. It showed up at the root top level of my bookmarks... so, a la Microsoft, I proceeded to move it to its appropriate folder as I have it in my iMac. So far, so good. Then I proceeded to check my iPad and iPhone and the new bookmark is NOWHERE to be found!!! Isn't this wonderful how iCloud works!??? I love the fact that it frustrates me and create unncessary work and waste of time and lack of efficiency and effectiveness!


Yesterday I added a new note from my iPhone and guess what happened... the new note never showed up in ANY of my other devices!!!! So, once again, I proceeded to remove that new note and add it from my iPad. A few minutes later... I had multiple duplicates of Notes in my iPad and the new note was nowhere to be found in any of my other devices inspite of the fact I have full iCloud features enabled! So, I then proceeded to clean up the extra duplicate entries from my iPad... and what happened next was just so kewl... ALL, I mean ALL my notes I had in my other devices were WIPED OUT!!!! But now things looks clean and tidy from my iPad!!! Go figure! I waited to see if they will sync to my other devices and NOTHING!


At this point I was so fuming you could fry an egg on my forehead of the frustration! So, I proceeded to wipe--out my notes from my iPad and waited to make sure no more duplcates were going to show-up. I then went to my iMac and from there launched TimeMachine and restore my notes and then created the new note and wala... now it shows OK in ALL my devices! So, the morale of the story for me is... don't enter Bookmarks from my iOS devices. Do it from my Mac machines... at least they'll be (after manually moving the entry from the other machine) in sync and do not add any new notes from any iOS device but to it from my iMac or MBP so that it syncs OK...


Isn't this a wonderful story of how great and amazing iCloud works? Wow... I'm even impress with myself... but I've been close in more than once occassion of using a baseball bat and my devices as a Piñata from the frustration 🙂

Nov 26, 2011 7:21 AM in response to joey66

Ok, I really don't get this.


I turned off syncing of bookmark on all of my devices. Then i deleted all 18.000 bookmarks inside safari on my mac using bookdog, since thats one of the only ways to delete more that one bookmark at the time.


I then deleted the few remaining bookmarks on my iphone and ipad and waited for about 10 min.


The I turned on icloud bookmark syncing on my mac a waited a little.


Not supprised, ALL of the bokmarks came back. Now I went ahead to delete all the bookmarks once more using bookdog, this time while icloud bookmark sync is stille on.


Now, when I start safari on my mac, all the bookmarks are gone, and iclod bookmark sync is on.


The wired thing is though, when I turn on icloud bookmark sync on eighter my iphone or ipad, all the 18.000 bookmarks still ends up on those devices?!?


Now, whats going on?


Why can't I just WIPE all of those **** icloud bookmarks once and for all??

Dec 20, 2011 2:55 PM in response to Andrew White2

Turn off Bookmarks in iCloud from your iDevice then open iTunes on your computer and go to your iPhone (thoriugh iTunes), select sync bookmarks and choose Internet Explorer (before syncing your iPhone, open Internet Explorer and delete all the bookmarks there so you dont get all those unnecessary ones) now sync your iPhone. You wont have your previous bookmarks. Also leave your Bookmarks in iCloud off. Hope this solves it. 🙂

Dec 29, 2011 1:20 AM in response to Andrew White2

Bookmarks got messed up using iCloud synch and a MB Air, an iPhone 4S and 2 iPad2s. Running 10.7.2 and 5.01.1.


Solution:

Disable the bookmark synch in the iCloud panel on the iPhone and iPads. Choose the option to delete the bookmarks on the devices - very important.


On the MB Air, manually tidy up. Which for me consisted of holding down the delete button for about 3 minutes. Fun.


Since the Air is still synched to the iCloud this tidied up the bookmarks there.


Then re-enable the synch on the mobile devices. The bookmarks will replicate the set-up on the MB Air.


I think I ended up in this mess because I tried the iCloud control panel for WIndows on a PC desktop. That messed up a lot of things I've abandoned the Windows side of the iCloud.

how do I delete my iCloud bookmarks and upload a new bookmark file

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