Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

[jcphil]

I decided I missed having my add-ons work in Firefox, so installed Firefox 2. Only Firefox 2 won't run at all. I get no feedback when I start from the command line. I do see broken sym links in /usr/lib/firefox:

libnss3.so -> ../libnss3.so.0d
libsmime3.so -> ../libsmime3.so.0d
libsoftokn3.so -> ../libsoftokn3.so.0d
libssl3.so -> ../libssl3.so.0d

Does anybody know what I should add to make it work? I am using the Firefox 2 that comes from Hardy Heron repositories in Adept. So, I assumed there was *some* dependency checking.

[integr8e]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

Try this and see if it helps:

sudo aptitude purge firefox

sudo aptitude install firefox

Then, try running firefox again, from the command line if necessary, and post your results.

[jcphil]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

Thanks for the suggestion. This seems to make no difference. The script firefox-2 starts and gets a process id, but that process id dies immediately with no feedback whatsoever. Without the feedback, I have no clue as to whay it's dying. I have never seen Firefox behave this way. Normally, it gives more feedback than you could ever want.

[ElectronicCarpenter]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

I had the same problem firefox 3 corrupted my chrome file. Here is what to do. uninstall firexox3 and firefox in the package manager.
reinstall firefox 2
log out
log in (Windows habits are so hard to break) :-X
Now remove all traces of the firefox3 in
/etc
/home
sudo rm -r
If that doesn't list the hidden home directory files for me and let me see what you missed.

[Fintan]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

I had the same issue a few weeks ago:
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3091481.0

What I did was install swiftweasel:
http://swiftweasel.tuxfamily.org/wik...itle=Main_Page

Here si a good way of doing this:
http://swiftweasel.tuxfamily.org/wik...php5?title=Apt

apart from swiftweasel being optimized for your system it also gives you a separate /hoem/username/./mozilla/swiftweasel file. This lets you use/install all of your add-ons and themes without touching the firefox profiles.

I hope that helps

[jcphil]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

I tried the remedy suggested above by ElectronicCarpenter. And the outcome is...Firefix 2 still does absolutely nothing. I can only take this as an absolutely horrible job of package creation and dependency setting. I'm about ready to download Firefox 2 direct from mozilla.org and just run it from the command line in my home directory. I know I can get that to work. I just don't know why it should be so hard to install and use the *stable* version of Firefox. This has almost been enough to make me switch distros.

[integr8e]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

OK, try renaming your $HOME/.mozilla/firefox directory to something like "firefox.bak"; then, try running Firefox again.  If the problem is just a funny setting in that file, Firefox will recreate the default one and use it instead.

(Also, I haven't had any issues with FF3 from the repos; you may want to give it a try)

[jcphil]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

Also no dice. But somewhere in the mix, I lost all settings in .mozilla. Absolutely amazing! I'm following my own suggestion now and downloading from mozilla.org. My wife and daughter aren't bothered by Firefox 3.0, because they don't use the add-ons.

[Fintan]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

I'm following my own suggestion now and downloading from mozilla.org. My wife and daughter aren't bothered by Firefox 3.0, because they don't use the add-ons.

Ive been down that path.

If you do that you will have to get rid of FF3 all together as they share the same profiles.
Thus you can either create a new profile for ff2 or make a profile folder for FF2 and point FF2 to that.

That is why I chose the swift weasel path

By the way it is faster and eats much less resources that FF.

Wither way good luck

[jcphil]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

Well, I'm moving more in your direction. By following the manual installation on the page you pointed me to, I got Firefox 2 working as a defalut browser. But it won't allow me to install aany add-ons whatsoever! I have to say this was a monumentally stupid move on the part of Canonical and one made with no consideration for user impact. Did you submit this as a bug earlier?

[jcphil]

Re: Firefox 2 does nothing at startup

The manual installation finally worked after I started with a fresh ,mozilla directory. I had to give up lots of other settings (like passwords) but the add-ons work now. Without them, I might as well be using IE.