Ubuntu
firefox-3.0 package

Firefox not saving preferences.

Asked by Jerfo

I've been having this problem for a while now, it manifests in these ways (at least, that I have noticed):

On my bookmarks tab, everytime I remove the 'Most Visited' one, it reappears when I start Firefox again;
When I close Firefox with several tabs open, even if I select 'Save & Quit', no tabs will be saved, it will start solely on the homepage;
A bar keeps showing about knowing my rights regarding this type of open software, I've already read it and no matter how many times I close it, it appears again eventually;
Sometimes it won't start on homepage but on another sort of welcome page regarding Ubuntu, I think the URL had something like 'chrome' on it;
Lastly, although I don't know if it is because of Mozilla or because of Gmail but if I choose the 'Newer Version', the next time I open it, it's back to the 'Older Version'.

There's one more issue but I don't know if it's related either, when I have more than 2 tabs with flash content open, the computer starts to slow down terribly, the movies will play (if they play at all) with no sound issues, but the video will refresh the frame about every second or so, this has always been an issue since I use Firefox on Ubuntu, it was never a problem with Firefox on XP.

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Ubuntu firefox-3.0 Edit question
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amit
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Revision history for this message
amit (amit-ramjas) said : 		#1

please tell is your ubuntu fully updated including firefox and flash codec
also your distribution number

for preferences problem:
do you see some error messages that -- firefox is already running; close other windows or similar
in that case write permissions are wrong for .mozilla directory in your home folder
(it is hidden type ctrl+h to see hidden directories)
you can check that by right clicking .mozilla directory --->select properties --->permissions
you must have write permissions for it
else your firefox is unable to close in proper way and thus your changes are rejected
also check edit -->prefrences-->main in firefox do u have

for chrome: -ubuntu page it is shown when Firefox is unable to find INTERNET access
it is default homepage for any browser in ubuntu --a intro to ubuntu is shown

for g mail ---- do u have JavaScript blocked -- please enable it if already enabled then
problem is definitely not related to ubuntu or Firefox --- it is on g mail what sort of web page they sent to you

i am also facing problem with Firefox for flash
what i do is to pause the video through the you tube interface and let it download
then i go to /tmp directory and now i can play the video with totem without using much CPU
the videos can be copied from there also (but before closing the Firefox tab in which that video is being loaded )

please also have a look here and some related links on that page
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=428979&highlight=firefox+crash+flash&page=4

Revision history for this message
Jerfo (md-alanhernandez) said : 		#2

My Ubuntu is always up to date, I always download the updates as soon as it informs me of them, as for Firefox and flash codec, I'm not sure, Firefox is 3.0.4 and the flash codec I don't even know how to check that, I downloaded it about a month ago when I began using Ubuntu.

As for the error message, yeah, I see that often, I tried to do the right clicking but wasn't too sure where the write permissions should be, here is what I saw:

Onwer: jerfo
folder access: Create and delete files
File access: ---

Group: jerfo
Folder access: Access files
file access: ---

Other
Folder access: Access files
file access: ---

Execute: [-] allow executing file as program

Lastly, Javascript is enabled.

I hope this information provides is enough.

Revision history for this message
Best amit (amit-ramjas) said : 		#3

write permissions have to be for owner part of permissions; so directory permissions look ok
well in firefox 3.04 you can check flash codec in tools-->add ons->plugins ---- search for flash plugin

could you take a backup of your .mozilla directory by renaming your .mozilla to something .mozilla-bak
this is to ensure if solution doesn't work then you can easily reverse the process and your data wont be lost

after renaming the folder
now restart Firefox
new .mozilla folder will be automatically created with default settings
and try to change setting like homepage etc
are you now able to save the settings now ??

if solution don't help then delete the new .mozilla folder and rename the .mozilla-bak to .mozilla
and i wont be able to help you anymore

i hope it helps

Revision history for this message
Jerfo (md-alanhernandez) said : 		#4

Thank you very much, it's now working normally, well, except for flash (which btw is Shockwave Flash 10.0 r12) and Gmail, but I shall contact them about the problem.

Revision history for this message
Jerfo (md-alanhernandez) said : 		#5

Thanks amit, that solved my question.