Firefox problem

[satimis]

Hi folks,


Ubuntu 7.04 LAMP server amd64


Recently Firefox seems running unstable, sometime taking long time to start and another time failing to start at all hanging there for prolonged time. I have to reboot the PC then it becomes normal. During browsing Internet it occasonally has no response just hanging there. Ping yahoo/google is working.

Please advise where shall I check and how to fix the problem. TIA


B.R.
satimis

[oz]

Make sure FF is closed, then try renaming your hidden /home/username/.mozilla folder.

Then start FF so the folder can rebuild itself. If the problem is gone, you can fetch your bookmarks from the renamed folder. Otherwise, you can delete the new folder and rename the old folder back to .mozilla and be no worse off than you are now.

[satimis]

Make sure FF is closed, then try renaming your hidden /home/username/.mozilla folder.

Then start FF so the folder can rebuild itself. If the problem is gone, you can fetch your bookmarks from the renamed folder. Otherwise, you can delete the new folder and rename the old folder back to .mozilla and be no worse off than you are now.

Hi ozar,


Thanks for your advice. Performed following steps;

Stop FF running

$ sudo mv /home/satimis/.mozilla /home/satimis/.mozilla.old


Start FF

FF seems working nicely.


Now all plugin gone.

$ ls -ls .mozilla.old/firefox/

total 12
4 -rw------- 1 satimis satimis  305 2008-06-22 19:08 pluginreg.dat
4 -rw-r--r-- 1 satimis satimis   94 2008-04-04 09:08 profiles.ini
4 drwx------ 7 satimis satimis 4096 2008-06-23 00:44 s7mn38a9.default

$ ls -la .mozilla/firefox/

total 20
drwx------ 3 satimis satimis 4096 2008-06-23 00:47 .
drwx------ 3 satimis satimis 4096 2008-06-23 00:47 ..
drwx------ 6 satimis satimis 4096 2008-06-23 01:42 af0qdtmh.default
-rw------- 1 satimis satimis  305 2008-06-23 01:33 pluginreg.dat
-rw-r--r-- 1 satimis satimis   94 2008-06-23 00:47 profiles.ini

Can I copy back the old pluginreg.dat to the working FF to recover the plugins? TIA


B.R.
satimis

[oz]

My personal opinion is that you should reinstall your plugins from scratch, one at a time.

It might be one of them that was causing the problem. Reinstalling them one by one might help you to identify which one was the trouble maker. If one of them became corrupted somehow, reinstalling from scratch should fix that, too.

[satimis]

My personal opinion is that you should reinstall your plugins from scratch, one at a time.

It might be one of them that was causing the problem. Reinstalling them one by one might help you to identify which one was the trouble maker. If one of them became corrupted somehow, reinstalling from scratch should fix that, too.

Hi Ozar,


Thanks for your advice.


It comes to my notice that the problem still remains. After switching off the PC several hours and turning it the first time FF takes long time to load. I have to close FF and reboot PC.

Start FF. It still takes long time to load. Finally FF starts. Please advise where shall I check again. TIA

Ping websites without problem.


B.R.
satimis

[oz]

I really have no idea what could be happening at this point.

What version of Firefox are your running?

Have you tried uninstalling Firefox completely and renaming the hidden .mozilla folder like you did above, then reinstalling Firefox from scratch?

That might do it.

You could also try starting Firefox from within a terminal to see if it gives you any errors.

If you are running Firefox 3, try going to Edit / Preferences / Security and unchecking the checkboxes next to "Tell me if the site I'm visiting is a suspected attack site" and "Tell me if the site I'm visiting is a suspected forgery". Some folks have been reporting system hangs because of those two functions messing heavily with system memory. This issue was reportedly fixed, but it still seems to be affecting some users.