[Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

bediger4000 · 2026-05-17 00:50:48

Dell E7420 laptop,
Linux anagram 7.0.8-zen1-1-zen #1 ZEN SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Fri, 15 May 2026 16:45:03 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux
xorg-server 21.1.22-2
i3-wm 4.25.1-1
Firefox 150.0.3-1

Until I did "pacman -Syu" yesterday, I could "Save Image As" and "Save Page As" to a local file. The menu for doing those save-as pops up when I right click on an image displayed on a web page. Choosing "Save Image As" or "Save File As" causes the menu to disappear but no save-to-file dialog appears.

I also get the same behavior out of Firefox with "xorg-twm", so it probably isn't a window manager issue. I had Firefox 1.49.0.2-1 installed until yesterday. i3-wm isn't updated very often so it's the same.

It seems like the failure is in the save-to-file dialog, but who really knows?

Last edited by bediger4000 (2026-05-17 20:39:53)

xerxes_ · 2026-05-17 10:25:20

xdg-desktop-portal related ? :
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=313451
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=313183
https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=313374
I have also newest i3-wm & firefox and everything works.

bediger4000 · 2026-05-17 15:02:20

I've followed up on all of the suggestions in the above threads - I've reinstalled firefox, all of the gtk* and xdg* packages suggested for re-install. I installed gedit as one of the threads suggested. Save-to-file dialog opens just fine. I've opened "about:config" and changed the last downloaded to directory by hand. Nothing changes.

I ran firefox from an xterm, firefox does output some logging, but nothing during a right-click -> "Save Image As".

To add to the mystery, chromium has the same behavior with "Save Image As" and "Save As". No save-file-dialog, no error popup, no nothing.

seth · 2026-05-17 16:11:18

How do you start i3? xinit/startx? See the last link below, 2nd blue note about what to include at least - in doubt post your xinitrc.

bediger4000 · 2026-05-17 19:56:37

I "fixed" this problem by uninstalling simple-scan, libadwaita, gtk4, xdg-desktop-portal-gtk, xdg-desktop-portal packages, then rebooting. Even after uninstalling the packages and exiting i3, to get back to the login prompt, then starting Xorg again, something caused firefox to want to do xdg-desktop-portal oprations. It took a reboot to get "Save Image As" to show a save-file-dialog.

I'm reasonably certain that Firefox 150 brought in the problem, because I've had simple-scan, libadwaita, gtk4 and the xdg-desktop-portal* packages installed well before firefox 150. I tried uninstalling Firefox 150 and re-installing 149.0.2, but re-installed Firefox 149 wouldn't use a profile that had already been "upgraded", so I can't say if that would fix things.

I found some kind of error logging to go with "Save File As" and "Save Image As". This is what journalctl -f says when I "Save Image As" with firefox:

May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: Starting Portal service (GTK/GNOME implementation)...
May 17 10:03:09 anagram xdg-desktop-portal-gtk[35319]: cannot open display: 
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: Failed to start Portal service (GTK/GNOME implementation).
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: Starting Portal service (GTK/GNOME implementation)...
May 17 10:03:09 anagram xdg-desktop-portal-gtk[35322]: cannot open display: 
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=1/FAILURE
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
May 17 10:03:09 anagram systemd[767]: Failed to start Portal service (GTK/GNOME implementation).
May 17 10:03:09 anagram /usr/lib/xdg-desktop-portal[1011]: Backend call failed: Could not activate remote peer 'org.freedesktop.impl.portal.desktop.gtk': startup job failed

There's a NixOS issue that kind of fixes this same problem by putting Environment=DISPLAY=:0 in the xdg-desktop-portal-gtk unit file. That didn't work for me.

But there's something deeper going on:

861 % sudo systemctl status xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service
Unit xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service could not be found.

862 % sudo systemctl enable xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service   
Failed to enable unit: Unit xdg-desktop-portal-gtk.service does not exist

Files /usr/lib/systemd/user/xdg-desktop-portal.service and /usr/lib/systemd/user/xdg-desktop-portal.service exist, are readable, and look like systemd service files to my eye. Usually, systemctl is pretty good about finding units so the failure of the systemctl enable is really puzzling.

Neither firefox nor chromium (which exhibits the same problem on "Save Image As") packages say they depend on xdg-desktop-portal or xdg-desktop-portal-gtk. What's up with firefox-the-process using them if present?

Last edited by bediger4000 (2026-05-17 20:46:37)

bediger4000 · 2026-05-17 20:01:34

Just to keep all info in thread, here's my .xinitrc. I start the X11 server with "startx". I am very conservative about window managers and so forth. Looks like my .xinitrc is at least 25 years old, and still references twm in comments.

#!/bin/sh
# $Xorg: xinitrc.cpp,v 1.3 2000/08/17 19:54:30 cpqbld Exp $

userresources=$HOME/.Xresources
usermodmap=$HOME/.Xmodmap
sysresources=/usr/lib/X11/xinit/.Xresources
sysmodmap=/usr/lib/X11/xinit/.Xmodmap

# merge in defaults and keymaps

if [ -f $sysresources ]; then
    /usr/bin/xrdb -merge $sysresources
fi

if [ -f $sysmodmap ]; then
    /usr/bin/xmodmap $sysmodmap
fi

if [ -f $userresources ]; then
    /usr/bin/xrdb -merge $userresources
fi

if [ -f $usermodmap ]; then
    /usr/bin/xmodmap $usermodmap
fi

# start some nice programs

failsafe="xterm -ls -T Failsave -geometry 80x24-0-0"
trap "exec $failsafe" EXIT SIGHUP SIGINT SIGPIPE SIGTERM SIGIO

export LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8

# sandwich xclock and xcb vertically
# xclock -strftime might only be for Linux, or maybe GNU strftime
#(sleep 1; xclock -digital  -strftime '%FT%T%z' -geometry 250x30+183+13) &
#(sleep 1; xcb -geometry +442+-8 ) &

HN=$(hostname)

OPT1=-u8
OPT2="-fn -misc-fixed-bold-r-normal--15-140-75-75-c-90-iso10646-1"
       -aaron-bitocra-medium-r-normal--0-0-72-72-m-0-iso8859-1


#(sleep 1; xterm -geometry 80x24+12+163  $OPT1 $OPT2 -sb -sl 1000 -T $HN -n $HN -bg white -fg black) &
#(sleep 1; xterm  -geometry 80x24-79-21  $OPT1 $OPT2 -sb -sl 1000  -T $HN -n $HN -bg white -fg black)&
#(sleep 1; xterm  -geometry 80x24-76+157  $OPT1 $OPT2 -sb -sl 1000 -T $HN -n $HN -bg white -fg black) &
#(sleep 1; xterm  -geometry 80x24+19-29  $OPT1 $OPT2 -sb -sl 1000  -T $HN -n $HN -bg white -fg black)&

#xsetroot -solid darkgrey
xsetroot -solid white
xautolock -time 10 -locker "xset dpms force off" &

export GTK_USE_PORTAL=1
export GDK_DEBUG=portals

#exec /usr/bin/twm 
exec /usr/bin/i3 

$failsafe
exit 0

Last edited by bediger4000 (2026-05-17 20:45:35)

seth · 2026-05-17 20:05:47

Please use [code][/code] tags, then indeed see the last link below.
/etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.d/50-systemd-user.sh is critical for proper logind and session bus integration (a and most likely *the* reason why the dbus-drive portal fails for you)

bediger4000 · 2026-05-17 21:01:40

Thank you. That last if-then block in the 2nd blue note's file, which sources files in /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc.d, did the trick. I had looked at that note from one of your answers in another (maybe related) thread, but missed the sourcing. I'll be more thorough next time.

Arch Linux

#1 2026-05-17 00:50:48

[Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#2 2026-05-17 10:25:20

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#3 2026-05-17 15:02:20

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#4 2026-05-17 16:11:18

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#5 2026-05-17 19:56:37

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#6 2026-05-17 20:01:34

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#7 2026-05-17 20:05:47

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

#8 2026-05-17 21:01:40

Re: [Solved] Firefox 150: right-mouse-click "Save Image As" doesn't work

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