hello, please try the following steps in order to restore the search function on the default homepage:

1. go to firefox > help > troubleshooting information and click on profile folder/show folder. a windows explorer window should open up - in there delete the file named chromeappsstore.sqlite.
2. then enter about:config into the firefox location bar (confirm the info message in case it shows up) & search for the preference named browser.startup.homepage_override.mstone - right-click and reset that entry to the default value.
3. restart firefox

it worked thanks very much

Thanks for the tip ... since I'm using FF on Lubuntu (Linux) the offending file was named webappsstore.sqlite. I deleted that file & reset the browser.startup.homepage_override.mstone entry as mentioned above =)

Current Firefox versions no longer store the search engine that is used on the about:home page in chromeappsstore.sqlite, but use the default search engine (pref: browser.search.defaultenginename) and the SearchReset extension may be able to fix this.

Try to use the SearchReset extension to reset some preferences to the default values.

• https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/searchreset/

Note that the SearchReset extension only runs once and then uninstalls automatically, so it won't show on the "Firefox > Add-ons" page (about:addons).

If you do not keep changes after a restart or otherwise then see:

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/Preferences_not_saved