Arch Linux

thewebdoctor

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From: North Georgia, North America

Registered: 2011-03-08

Posts: 30

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SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

I'm a long-time user of Linux (mostly Ubuntu), but a brand-new user of Arch.

I just installed the 64-bit core version, using the helpful procedure at Lifehacker. I did the general updates and then used pacman to install "firefox." It all seemed to go OK, but when I enter "firefox" in the terminal, the prompt comes back immediately with no output and no window.

Lane

Last edited by thewebdoctor (2011-03-10 22:49:51)

ngoonee

Forum Fellow

From: Between Thailand and Singapore

Registered: 2009-03-17

Posts: 7,356

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

That article is a waste of space, they should have just linked to our Beginner's Guide in the wiki.

Is your system fully-updated? Is your mirror up-to-date? Check the wiki if you don't understand what I'm asking.

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jasonwryan-Installing Arch is a measure of your literacy. Maintaining Arch is a measure of your diligence. Contributing to Arch is a measure of your competence.
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thewebdoctor

Member

From: North Georgia, North America

Registered: 2011-03-08

Posts: 30

Website

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

That article is a waste of space, they should have just linked to our Beginner's Guide in the wiki.

Is your system fully-updated? Is your mirror up-to-date? Check the wiki if you don't understand what I'm asking.

Well, Lifehacker's article on distros linked to the above article, or otherwise I might not have decided to try Arch.

After the install, I used /etc/pacman.d/mirrorlist to select mirrors. I see from the Beginner's Wiki I should have done a lot more work in order to get good mirrors.

I'm going to use Mirrorlist Generator to make a new list. I don't see whether high or low status numbers are best, but since the lowest are at the top, I assume they're the best.

I ran pacman -Syu until it said it was finished, but I'll do it again after getting a new list of mirrors. Then I'll try reinstalling Firefox.

Lane

thewebdoctor

Member

From: North Georgia, North America

Registered: 2011-03-08

Posts: 30

Website

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

I see I forgot about this post and posted the same whine in another forum. Pardon me.

Before it got deleted, someone replied, "No output at all? Have you tried launching it via /usr/bin/firefox?" Yes, that command does the same thing: no output at all.

Someone suggested a reboot. There have been some reboots since the package was installed.

Lane

litemotiv

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2008-08-01

Posts: 5,026

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

Do you get any output if you only issue a 'firefox --help' ?

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eLBelga

Member

Registered: 2011-03-02

Posts: 10

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

Does 'firefox -safe-mode' work?

Delete the /home/USERNAME/.mozilla/firefox folder and restart firefox. What happens now?

thewebdoctor

Member

From: North Georgia, North America

Registered: 2011-03-08

Posts: 30

Website

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

Thanks for the suggestions. Following your suggestions led to the solution, although I don't like it much.

I use Firefox very heavily with lots of cookies, customizations, and addons. I also have several partitions with different distros installed on them. In order to keep Firefox synchronized among them, I keep .mozilla in /opt and symlink it to each home folder in each distro's partition.

This works fine with Firefox, but I see now it doesn't work with Namoroka. When I deleted the symlink, Namoroka started.

Too bad.

Lane

Last edited by thewebdoctor (2011-03-10 22:50:39)

litemotiv

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2008-08-01

Posts: 5,026

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

thewebdoctor, just for future purpose: it really helps if you tell things like that first when asking for help, instead of saying "new install, did pacman -S firefox". We can only rely on what you tell us, and your multi-distro symlinking scenario makes things completely different obviously.

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kyla

Member

From: Arlington, VA

Registered: 2011-03-12

Posts: 112

Website

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

Re: syncing

I believe that firefox 4 has a "firefox syncing" thing in it, maybe this could work as an alternative to what you've been doing?

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thewebdoctor

Member

From: North Georgia, North America

Registered: 2011-03-08

Posts: 30

Website

Re: SOLVED (SORT OF): Firefox Won't Start in New Install

Re: syncing

I believe that firefox 4 has a "firefox syncing" thing in it, maybe this could work as an alternative to what you've been doing?

Thanks, Kyla. I think I've run across that plugin in Firefox 3, as well. I'll look into just what it does and see if it could substitute.

Interestingly, for some reason the linked .mozilla  in /opt is now working with Namoroka.

Firefox 4 is available in a compiled 64-bit version, and I have it running in Arch. Regretfully, some important plugins have yet to be updated to this version, so I can't run it in place of version 3.

I looked around, and it seems the only 64-bit versions of Firefox 3 are as packages for various distros. I have had very mixed results with compiling, so I generally stay away from it.

Lane