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I have relative links in a menu page of the form:

<li><a href="info.htm#part1">See Part 1 of the problem</a></li>

In the target page, the anchor is made as follows:

<h1><a name="part1">Part 1 of the Problem</a></h1>

Now, after upgrading to Firefox 4, I am getting a 405 error:

URL /Part1.html not found.

IE works OK on the same links.

That error message does not even make any sense. Part1 is not the URL for the page.

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Dani AI

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Good catch, — this is a classic stale-cache symptom: the browser served an older copy of the menu file so the anchor targets no longer matched the current site. A one‑off fix is a hard reload (Windows/Linux: Ctrl+F5 or Ctrl+Shift+R; Mac: Cmd+Shift+R) or Shift+click the Reload button; the Developer Tools also offer a “Disable cache (when toolbox is open)” option for development sessions. (support.mozilla.org)

For a persistent fix, check the advanced preference that controls how often Firefox revalidates cached pages: open about:config and inspect browser.cache.check_doc_frequency. Its common values are 0 (once per session), 1 (every load), 2 (never check — always use cache), and 3 (automatic/default). If that pref was set to 2, Firefox will happily present an old page until a manual refresh; setting it back to 3 (or 1 for stricter checking) restores normal behavior. (superuser.com)

To make settings survive upgrades or profile changes, use a profile-level user.js (preferences placed there are applied on startup) or, for managed environments, a policies.json deployment to lock configuration across updates. Note that user.js will override manual about:config edits at each start, so use it deliberately and back up prefs.js first. (www-archive.mozilla.org)

Additional safeguards: keep server-side cache headers explicit (use Cache-Control, ETag or no-cache for HTML that must revalidate) so clients and intermediaries behave predictably; and when testing, open DevTools → Network and enable “Disable cache” while the toolbox is open. These measures reduce surprises from local or intermediary caches. (developer.mozilla.org)

Member Avatar for MidiMagic

I found the trouble. Firefox 4 somehow dug up a week-old version of the menu page from the cache. The urls of those pages were different in the old version. Yet, FF 3.6 had displayed the new version correctly for a week.

I found the trouble by viewing the source. It didn't match my new code.

Refreshing the page fixed it. I didn't think of it, because the FF 3.6 had been displaying the new page for a week.

Now, how do we keep software companies from changing your settings when they upgrade your software? I found automatic checking for new versions of web pages disabled.

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