Clear download list in Firefox
Firefox by default never clears the download list automatically. If you wish change the way Firefox works so it will clear the downloads either automatically upon download complete or when Firefox closes following the next steps.
- Type about:config in your address bar
- Search for browser.download.manager.retention
- Set its value to either 0, 1 or 2 depending on how you Firefox to behave
0 indicates that the download should be removed upon completion.
1 indicates that completed and canceled downloads should be removed when Firefox closes.
2 indicates that downloads should never be removed automatically. (default)
Firefox 26 does not clear download history automatically regardless of the setting of browser.download.manager.retention. Judging from online comments, this has happened before due to updates or “interface changes”, and they’re not treating this as a bug. Hard to imagine why.
I noticed that as well, and from my research I am afraid there isn’t a solution at the moment for this (at least not without taking the plugin route).
This is mainly because with the release of Firefox 26 they removed quite a few variables, including the ability to enable the old download manager and by the looks of it the browser.download.manager.retention variable as well which was tied to it.