Firefox-esr after update Failed to read config file

Hardware Librem 5
1

Hi all,
I updated my librem 5 2 days ago and there was an update for firefox-esr.
After this update I got an error when starting Firefox:

Failed to open config file

I saw that it was a security update on the way so I was waiting for this and hope that it would fix it.
Today I updated with the latest security update, but still the same problem at start, a popup saying that Firefox fails to read config.
I tried to reconfigure:

dpkg re-configure firefox-esr
dpkg re-configure firefox-esr-mobile-config

But still the same problem.
I tried to reinstall firefox:

apt remove firefox-esr
apt purge firefox-esr
apt remove firefox-esr-mobile-config
apt install firefox-esr
apt install firefox-esr-mobile-config

But still the same problem.
I tried to run firefox med --jsconsole to get errors and this is what I find:

NS_ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND: Component returned failure code: 0x80520012 (NS_ERROR_FILE_NOT_FOUND) [nsIXPCComponents_Utils.import] mobile-config-autoconfig.js:8
NS_ERROR_NOT_IMPLEMENTED: Component returned failure code: 0x80004001 (NS_ERROR_NOT_IMPLEMENTED) [nsIAppStartup.secondsSinceLastOSRestart]
    _collectStartupConditionsTelemetry resource:///modules/BrowserGlue.sys.mjs:1830
    BG__onFirstWindowLoaded resource:///modules/BrowserGlue.sys.mjs:1901
    BG_observe resource:///modules/BrowserGlue.sys.mjs:1126
    _delayedStartup chrome://browser/content/browser-init.js:616
BrowserGlue.sys.mjs:1839:15
CustomizableUI: TypeError: aNode is null -- resource:///modules/CustomizableUI.sys.mjs:1724 2 CustomizableUI.sys.mjs:2768
CustomizableUI: TypeError: aNode is null -- resource:///modules/CustomizableUI.sys.mjs:1724 2 CustomizableUI.sys.mjs:2768

I tried to comment out line 8 in mobile-config-autoconfig.js but the problem seems to be further down the stack.

I would appreciate some input as I feel kind of stuck!
Many thanks in advance!

3 Likes
2

uninstall firefox-esr
delete the usr/lib/firefox-esr folder
reinstall firefox-esr

1 Like
3

Just guessing but … start Firefox from the command line using a different profile - or anything equivalent to that (with a view to seeing whether the problem associates with your Firefox profile).

3 Likes
4

I had already done this when I read your post. Nice clean install and no error on start. If course, it wiped user0/Emma’s awesome mobile-friendly-firefox mod. I went to the Codeberg site and downloaded 3.0.0, but it says: “It is required to install & launch Firefox… before running this install script.” Dunno why it is failing.

1 Like
5

You can use these instructions to install the Firefox ESR 128 track:

6

I have started Firefox today for the first time after all the updates. It greeted me with a pop-up declaring as follows.

Failed to read the configuration file. Please contact your system administrator.

Here is a screenshot of that dialogue window.

Знімок екрана з 2024-10-12 12-51-40

After clicking “OK”, it just proceeds with starting Firefox, which appears ordinary. Is it safe to just use it as is? Is it reasonable to expect that it will fix itself over time? The warning message is unhelpful. I rarely use Firefox and did not customize it in any way, so I am inclined to believe that there is a bug in the Firefox ESR update instead of an issue in the Librem 5 Byzantium setup.

$ uname -a
Linux pureos 6.6.0-1-librem5 #1 SMP PREEMPT Sun Jul  7 20:23:17 EDT 2024 aarch64 GNU/Linux
$ firefox --version
Mozilla Firefox 128.3.1esr
1 Like
7

Since you already have the old friendly fox files, try uninstalling:

sh Mobile-Friendly-Firefox/friendlyfox.sh uninstall.sh

and reinstalling again:

sh Mobile-Friendly-Firefox/friendlyfox.sh install.sh

That worked for me

1 Like
8

I can’t remember if PureOS for Librem 5 has the mobile-config automatically installed, but it was installed on mine. Removing it made the warning go away.

To do that you can run sudo apt remove firefox-esr-mobile-config

Make sure that all the dashes are in there, because if you use a space in there at the wrong spot then you might tell it to remove Firefox instead.

1 Like
9

I’m pretty sure that that package is installed by default.

Removing it also fixed the problem for me. I guess that’s only a temporary solution though.

1 Like
10

Unless the quite outdated firefox-esr-mobile-config is updated in PureOS Byzantium, removing it is the permanent solution.

You can always install user0’s customizations or postmarketOS’ mobile-config-firefox instead, which both are maintained to work with current Firefox (ESR).

6 Likes
11

Can confirm that removing this got rid of the dialog box on startup and I’m using User0’s customization…all good.

3 Likes