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I remove certain plugins and they reinstall themselves across all my synced machines.

  • 6 replies
  • 2 have this problem
  • 4 views
  • Last reply by FredMcD

Gin G Bear
Gin G Bear
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I have sync enabled on a desktop (Win 10 64bit), a windows laptop (also Win 10 64bit), and both OSX and Windows 10 on my MacBook Pro (both 64 bit). There are some legacy plugins that I don't care about any more, and I try to delete them. They delete successfully on whichever machine, and are gone upon restarting Firefox there...but later or the next day, they're back.

It acts like there's a sync issue, and it thinks that the plugins should be reinstalled because the "sync" master says they should be there. Am I missing something? Is there a way to log into Sync and remove them from there, so that they're removed from ALL my Firefox installations?

I have sync enabled on a desktop (Win 10 64bit), a windows laptop (also Win 10 64bit), and both OSX and Windows 10 on my MacBook Pro (both 64 bit). There are some legacy plugins that I don't care about any more, and I try to delete them. They delete successfully on whichever machine, and are gone upon restarting Firefox there...but later or the next day, they're back. It acts like there's a sync issue, and it thinks that the plugins should be reinstalled because the "sync" master says they should be there. Am I missing something? Is there a way to log into Sync and remove them from there, so that they're removed from ALL my Firefox installations?

Chosen solution

Forget that I used the word Plugin.

I meant ADD-ON.

Read this answer in context 👍 0

All Replies (6)

FredMcD
FredMcD
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Shut down sync, and try again. Do they come back?

Type about:addons<enter> in the address bar to open the Add-ons Manager. Hot key; <Control>(Mac=<Command>) <Shift> A)

On the left side of the page, select Plugins. Make sure the ones you want to use are set to Ask or Allow.

Extensions are options you install into Firefox, They can be remove at will. Plugins are from programs that Firefox finds already on your system. The only way to remove a plugin is to remove its program from your system.

Gin G Bear
Gin G Bear Question owner
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the Add-ons manager was where I first disabled them, then removed them.

I shut down sync and tried again, and they came back again.

I've resorted to NOT including add-ons with what I sync, and I will delete the add-ons from each instance of Firefox separately.

Thanks anyway.

FredMcD
FredMcD
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What are the things you what to remove?

If you removed them, and they returned, something is reloading them.

the-edmeister
the-edmeister
  • Moderator
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"Sync" doesn't come into play with Plugins. Extensions, Search engines, and some themes - yes.

Plugins aren't installed in Firefox, they are in the operating system where Firefox finds them via the applicable Windows Registry entries for each of those Plugins. To get rid of Plugins for Firefox in Windows, uninstall the program each of those Plugins are for; the program that installed the Plugin to begin with.

Not sure how Mac OSX handles Plugins.

Gin G Bear
Gin G Bear Question owner
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Chosen Solution

Forget that I used the word Plugin.

I meant ADD-ON.

FredMcD
FredMcD
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A post was flagged as Solved Problem. Please remove that flag. If you don’t, others that can help may not read this post.

Some add-ons are known adware. What are the names?

http://www.clamxav.com/ free malware scanner for Mac OS X https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-3291

You can also try https://www.malwarebytes.org/antimalware/mac/index.html