Phantom Firefox Install

[deerdrop]

Hello new friends!

Been on kubuntu for a full week now and I think it's everything I want out of a linux OS, so that's great. I've got a few tiny issues, but I'll keep them in separate posts for ease of discussion. I'm starting with this one because it's the weirdest.

Yesterday I go to open Firefox by clicking the icon I have pinned to my taskbar. It opens Firefox, but creating a new taskbar icon for it. Everything else about it seems normal. I've seen this happen before after software updates, where a desktop entry is out of sync or something, so I just unpin the old icon and pin the new one, and promptly forget about it.

Today I open Firefox and it's like a totally clean install. I have to log back in to sync, and subsequently everything I want to use. I assume a settings file got corrupted, and I'd pass off this first one as a fluke (since I hardly lost anything anyway) and resolve to investigate further if it happens again. But then I click on a hyperlink from a different app, and instead of opening a tab in the Firefox I have open, it boots up another Firefox (based on the taskbar icon, and also the fraction of a second longer it took to open the window) - one which has all of my settings, including the fact that it's set as my default browser. I confirm that these versions of Firefox exist separately by setting the other one to be default browser, and seeing that that made the first one no longer my default browser.

At this point I assume I have somehow accidentally installed Firefox from two sources. (I did not manually install or reinstall Firefox, but I did enable flatpak, so maybe when it tried to update Firefox it went wonky?) However, both Discover and apt claim that there is only one Firefox app installed.

solia@solinux:~$ apt list --installed | grep firefox

WARNING: apt does not have a stable CLI interface. Use with caution in scripts.

firefox/noble,now 1:1snap1-0ubuntu5 amd64 [installed,automatic]



The only other place I can see that there are two Firefoxes is in the default app settings, where they are listed separately in the dropdown, one as "Firefox" with no associated icon, and one as "Firefox Browser" with the icon. But even then, if I click on "Other..." to open the full menu, there is only one Firefox there to choose.

...As a new user I'm not able to upload images so I guess you'll have to take my word for it.

Due to this weirdness I'm not even sure if attempting to uninstall/reinstall is a good idea here. Even searching in dolphin I only see one Firefox folder with only one desktop file in it. I'm not sure where else to look or what else to look for.

Thanks in advance for your help.

[claydoh]

You only have one FF installed. it will be the Snap version.
The Deb you found is actually a 'dummy' that is there to make sure that this is the the case, at least for deb based packaging.
This doesn't affect Flatpak, so this is one way to have two FF installs, if you chose to do so.


Double icons are either a bug, or the pinned icon is not actually pinned to the Task Manager portion of the Panel, but a separate launcher widget dragged to the panel, and thus not part of the Task Manager at all.
Or one is using the old-skool task manager option that does this by default.

[deerdrop]

The Deb you found is actually a 'dummy' that is there to make sure that this is the the case, at least for deb based packaging.
This doesn't affect Flatpak, so this is one way to have two FF installs, if you chose to do so.

What deb? As I said in my post, I have poked around in the files, and I did not find a deb file in any of that, or anything else to hint at the presence of a whole second FF install. Also I did not choose to have two installs, this just happened on its own - I would very much like to have only one Firefox install, but I'm wary of what will happen if I tell it to uninstall Firefox because of all the other weirdness.

Double icons are either a bug, or the pinned icon is not actually pinned to the Task Manager portion of the Panel, but a separate launcher widget dragged to the panel, and thus not part of the Task Manager at all.
Or one is using the old-skool task manager option that does this by default.

I assure you this has all actually been the task manager, I'm aware of launcher widgets and those do not have an "unpin from task manager" option. I'm not sure where the old-skool option comes into it. I mean it's possible these two things were unrelated but I made sure to detail everything because it seems suspicious that the new FF icon, which was created when trying to open the old FF, has become a different install.

[claydoh]

What deb?

This one:

~$ apt list --installed | grep firefox

WARNING: apt does not have a stable CLI interface. Use with caution in scripts.

firefox/noble,now 1:1snap1-0ubuntu5 amd64 [installed,automatic]

Your FF is a Snap package. This deb above (apt is a tool specific to deb packages only) is the 'dummy' I mentioned

I'm wary of what will happen if I tell it to uninstall Firefox because of all the other weirdness.

Who has suggested this?

Remember, we are just trying to offer suggestions as to why one might experience something. We don't know your system, so many suggestions are made.

I offered three items that might cause this. It doesn't mean that these are true, just possibilities. If nothing else, they can be used to rule out some things.
it most likely is some bug in the task manager you are experiencing.

it seems suspicious that the new FF icon, which was created when trying to open the old FF, has become a different install.

how are you determining this? How could it even happen?
This is not possible, unless you installed a different FF or created a new FF profile - and you clearly haven't.

You might try removing the pinned FF you have, and adding a fresh one.
You might also in addition to removing it, to delete ~/.cache, log out and back in, then re-pin.
You might also delete the entire panel, then re-add a fresh one.

[deerdrop]

This deb above (apt is a tool specific to deb packages only) is the 'dummy' I mentioned

Ah, I didn't realize that. It said "snap" in there so I assumed apt was just able to see the snap install anyway. Given it can't, it makes sense the dummy package would just include snap in version number.

Remember, we are just trying to offer suggestions as to why one might experience something. We don't know your system, so many suggestions are made.

I offered three items that might cause this. It doesn't mean that these are true, just possibilities. If nothing else, they can be used to rule out some things.

I know? Uh... I hope I wasn't rude, I didn't mean to be. I'm just trying to give clear and complete responses so you understand why I'm ruling out certain suggestions. There's nothing worse than the poster who says "well no it's obviously not that" to an early suggestions only to return later saying it was.

it most likely is some bug in the task manager you are experiencing.

Is the task manager capable of starting an app in such a way that it has no access to its settings and cache files, and also that specific other parts of the computer don't recognize it as the same app? And doing so without me explicitly telling it to? You point out how impossible it is for a totally separate install to magically appear on my computer, and I agree, but this explanation doesn't feel much more satisfying to me.

Anyway, I wasn't being literal when I said that, I just meant that it feels like the two events ought to be related, rather than being two completely separate glitches that happened to affect the same app at around the same time. And if the bug is entirely with the task manager, then that would in fact satisfy that expectation.

So I will try your fix and report back.

[deerdrop]

Alright, so this is what I did:

1. Unpin and quit Firefox
2. Delete all files from ~/.cache
3. Reboot computer
4. Checked the default application settings again. There are still the two different listings for Firefox I mentioned above. (Is that expected? Is one of them the dummy app?) I changed this from Firefox to Firefox Web Browser, which has the icon - kinda seems like that should the "correct" answer.
5. Launched FF from the start menu. (I use Application Launcher, rather than Menu or Dashboard, if that makes a difference.) FF notifies me that it is not currently set as my default browser.
6. Opened a hyperlink from the same app that had originally revealed the issue, and... it opened in my currently open FF, instead of creating a new instance.

So it's... fixed? Kind of? It's less broken than it was before, but these behaviors are still strange.

...

Nope, ok, I performed one more step, which was to go into Firefox settings and from there chose to set it to be my default browser. Peeked at the settings app again, which is currently set to Firefox Web Browser, and no longer has the Firefox entry in the drop-down menu. Tried the hyperlink again and it opened in this window.

I suppose I'll have to call this solved, and just hope that no new weirdness happens tomorrow.

[claydoh]

Sorry, I did forget to ask you to check the properties for each of the menu entries you have, either via right- clicking them or via the Menu Editor via right clicking on the start menu icon.

The info will tell which executable and path is being used for each menu entry.

The dummy Deb isn't an app at all. It is there mostly to run scripting to install the snap version mainly for upgrades from past releases to replace the Deb version, and as a way for meta-packages to depend on and install the snap (apt doesn't handle non-deb things). It doesn't have or create a menu entry.

[deerdrop]

Hello, it's "tomorrow", and more weirdness has happened. Specifically, I'm back to the first thing again, where I can click on the icon I have pinned to the task manager, and what that does is open a FF window that gets its own icon on the taskbar, and the icon I clicked on still looks like an unopened application.


In KDE Menu Editor there is only one Firefox listed, it looks like this:



The full environment variable there is: BAMF_DESKTOP_FILE_HINT=/var/lib/snapd/desktop/applications/firefox_firefox.desktop

There also isn't currently a second Firefox to select in the Default Applications menu, which was the one place it was visible before.

I am not going to unpin the old icon this time.

[Princey]

That's weird. I tried replicating your case and it doesn't come close to what you've described. Question, did you add it as a widget or pinned it to the taskbar?

[claydoh]

Question, did you add it as a widget or pinned it to the taskbar?

Already addressed

I'm aware of launcher widgets and those do not have an "unpin from task manager" option.

[deerdrop]

Update: Firefox launches normally today. I can't imagine why it would flip-flop like this each time I restart my computer. We'll have to see what happens tomorrow.

[deerdrop]

Update: So there's just a tiny bit of weirdness left. If I shut down my computer without quitting firefox first, when I boot up my computer firefox will auto-boot, and the window will open with its own icon on the task manager. If I then close that window and reopen firefox with the pinned icon it will behave normally. (Note this is definitely not what happened the first time). So now I just always manually quit firefox before shutting down and hope this isn't a symptom of a larger issue that I'm ignoring. So... resolved, I guess.

[Princey]

Update: So there's just a tiny bit of weirdness left. If I shut down my computer without quitting firefox first, when I boot up my computer firefox will auto-boot, and the window will open with its own icon on the task manager. If I then close that window and reopen firefox with the pinned icon it will behave normally. (Note this is definitely not what happened the first time). So now I just always manually quit firefox before shutting down and hope this isn't a symptom of a larger issue that I'm ignoring. So... resolved, I guess.

Under System Settings, Startup/Shutdown, is Firefox listed as one of the apps? If not, under "Desktop Session" in that same window, there's a section "Session Restore". Check that the option "Start with empty session". That should get rid of that tiny bit of FireFox issues.

[deerdrop]

Under System Settings, Startup/Shutdown, is Firefox listed as one of the apps? If not, under "Desktop Session" in that same window, there's a section "Session Restore". Check that the option "Start with empty session". That should get rid of that tiny bit of FireFox issues.

It was not listed in the Autostart list, so I changed that Session Restore setting. Thank you!

[Princey]

Glad to know it worked. I think you should change the status of this post to either "resolved" or "solved". You can do so by editing the first post you made in this thread.