Member Avatar for Dan08

Hey, so as the title says my Firefox Web Browser doesn't want to start. It was working properly, but I guess after running a virus scan with KlamAV and quarantine a couple of errors that it gave me, it simply does not start. I've googled it, and I've tried a lot of things, like reinstalling it, use apt's autoremove option and deleting infos and temporary files myself. Well I'm running:

uname -a
Linux dan08-PC 2.6.31-19-generic #56-Ubuntu SMP Thu Jan 28 01:26:53 UTC 2010 i686 GNU/Linux

I'm not sure, how to get it to work now, by the way, when I click on:

Ubuntu Launcher -> Applications -> Internet -> Web Browser (Firefox Web Browser)

Nothing comes up, so I also tried in the command line "firefox", "sudo firefox" and "kdesudo firefox", and basically what I get is the following:

Couldn't load XPCOM.

Does anyone know how to reinstall it or any ideas, suggestions how can I put it working. Thanks Dan08.

Edited by Dan08 because: n/a
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Member Avatar for manuhar

Is your's personal computer ? if so dont use any antivirus program , i mean no need of . And try deleting .firefox or .mozilla file in home folder and try installing it.

Member Avatar for Dan08

Is your's personal computer ? if so dont use any antivirus program , i mean no need of . And try deleting .firefox or .mozilla file in home folder and try installing it.

Won't it corrupt anything on my system? Can you be more precise? I am not very confident about "trying deleting files"; If you understand me.

Member Avatar for JasonHippy

Won't it corrupt anything on my system? Can you be more precise? I am not very confident about "trying deleting files"; If you understand me.

What Manuhar has suggested is actually quite sensible and safe! If you open your home-directory with Nautilus and then press ctrl-h to show hidden files and folders you should see lots of directories with names that start with a full-stop.
Typically they just contain user-specific initialisation files and settings for individual programs.

By deleting the .mozilla directory from your home directory, it will simply erase any of your .ini settings for Firefox. It will also erase any add-ins that you've added to firefox (e.g. adblock plus, personas etc.), but that's no biggie, you can always re-install them. You might also lose any bookmarks you have and perhaps a few other firefox related odds 'n ends, but certainly nothing critical!

Anyway, if you delete the .mozilla folder and then re-start firefox, firefox should re-create the directory and set up a new ini file for you and hopefully that should allow Firefox to start up!

I've had similar problems with other programs in *nix, most noteably in Code::Blocks (a C++ IDE). There have been a few times where Code::Blocks has refused to start for me. But by removing the .codeblocks directory from my home folder (thus deleting the .ini files and other settings). The next time I try running Codeblocks, the program sets itself up from scratch, creating new ini files for itself and will actually run!

So deleting your .mozilla directory is at least worth a try, as I've said it will do no harm to your system!
Cheers for now,
Jas.

Edited by JasonHippy because: n/a
Member Avatar for Dan08

Sorry for this. Anyway I had to format my machine, everything is fine now. Thanks for the help guys. Dan08

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