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Firefox v122 --profile option is not working properly

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  • Last reply by zeroknight

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Hi,

  I am running the latest Firefox v122 (firefox_122.0+build1-0ubuntu0.22.04.1~mt1_amd64.deb not snap)

and when using the --profile option to specify the startup profile it fails to start even on a NEW system that never ran Firefox if I give it a directory that resides on a mounted ext3 filesystem.

  All the permissions are OK and yet running strace I see an error and after a few second will get the

generic pop-up with the error message: (after a few seconds)

Firefox is already running, but is not responding. To use Firefox, you must first close the existing Firefox process, restart your device, or use a different profile.

 Running the SAME from /tmp works fine, but I need the profile to reside on a persistent storage area

so if the LIVE distro restarts then it can restore the previous session, bookmarks, options, etc...


============================================================
 The 2 directories were created identically and have the exact same permissions:

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ mkdir /tmp/firefox3

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ mkdir /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ ls -ald /tmp/firefox3 drwxrwxr-x 17 xubuntu xubuntu 1080 Jan 21 22:05 /tmp/firefox3

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ ls -ald /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3 drwxrwxr-x 17 xubuntu xubuntu 4096 Jan 21 21:13 /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3

============================================================

The only difference is that one is mounted on tmpfs and the other is on /dev/nvme0n1p2:

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ df -k /tmp/firefox3 Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on tmpfs 32560016 351528 32208488 2% /tmp

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ df -k /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3 Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on /dev/nvme0n1p2 195751828 51056068 142695768 27% /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home


============================================================

When starting firefox with the /tmp/firefox3 profile directory it works fine and starts up:

xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ firefox --profile /tmp/firefox3

newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/firefox3", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0775, st_size=1040, ...}, 0) = 0 newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/firefox3/.parentlock", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=0, ...}, 0) = 0 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/firefox3/.parentlock", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC, 0666) = 11 fcntl(11, F_GETLK, {l_type=F_UNLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0, l_pid=-487933736}) = 0 fcntl(11, F_SETLK, {l_type=F_WRLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0}) = 0 uname({sysname="Linux", nodename="xubuntu", ...}) = 0


BUT when using the persistent storage on the real filesystem (but SAME exact permissions) it fails:

newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0775, st_size=4096, ...}, 0) = 0 newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3/.parentlock", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=0, ...}, 0) = 0 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3/.parentlock", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC, 0666) = 11 fcntl(11, F_GETLK, {l_type=F_UNLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0, l_pid=1519466008}) = 0 fcntl(11, F_SETLK, {l_type=F_WRLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0}) = -1 EACCES (Permission denied) close(11) = 0

Am I doing anything wrong or is this some weird startup issue / race condition in the parentlock management?

Thank you for looking into this.

  -Sanjiyan

PS: I can upload the full strace file for both scenarios if needed. Thanks again.

     running on an xubuntu distribution "22.04.2 LTS (Jammy Jellyfish)"
Hi, I am running the latest Firefox v122 (firefox_122.0+build1-0ubuntu0.22.04.1~mt1_amd64.deb not snap) and when using the --profile option to specify the startup profile it fails to start even on a NEW system that never ran Firefox if I give it a directory that resides on a mounted ext3 filesystem. All the permissions are OK and yet running strace I see an error and after a few second will get the generic pop-up with the error message: (after a few seconds) Firefox is already running, but is not responding. To use Firefox, you must first close the existing Firefox process, restart your device, or use a different profile. Running the SAME from /tmp works fine, but I need the profile to reside on a persistent storage area so if the LIVE distro restarts then it can restore the previous session, bookmarks, options, etc... ======================================================================== The 2 directories were created identically and have the exact same permissions: xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ mkdir /tmp/firefox3 xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ mkdir /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3 xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ ls -ald /tmp/firefox3 drwxrwxr-x 17 xubuntu xubuntu 1080 Jan 21 22:05 /tmp/firefox3 xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ ls -ald /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3 drwxrwxr-x 17 xubuntu xubuntu 4096 Jan 21 21:13 /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3 ======================================================================== The only difference is that one is mounted on tmpfs and the other is on /dev/nvme0n1p2: xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ df -k /tmp/firefox3 Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on tmpfs 32560016 351528 32208488 2% /tmp xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ df -k /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3 Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on /dev/nvme0n1p2 195751828 51056068 142695768 27% /media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home ======================================================================== When starting firefox with the /tmp/firefox3 profile directory it works fine and starts up: xubuntu@xubuntu:~$ firefox --profile /tmp/firefox3 newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/firefox3", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0775, st_size=1040, ...}, 0) = 0 newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/firefox3/.parentlock", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=0, ...}, 0) = 0 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/tmp/firefox3/.parentlock", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC, 0666) = 11 fcntl(11, F_GETLK, {l_type=F_UNLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0, l_pid=-487933736}) = 0 fcntl(11, F_SETLK, {l_type=F_WRLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0}) = 0 uname({sysname="Linux", nodename="xubuntu", ...}) = 0 BUT when using the persistent storage on the real filesystem (but SAME exact permissions) it fails: newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0775, st_size=4096, ...}, 0) = 0 newfstatat(AT_FDCWD, "/media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3/.parentlock", {st_mode=S_IFREG|0664, st_size=0, ...}, 0) = 0 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/media/xubuntu/sys_n01_home/mozilla/firefox3/.parentlock", O_WRONLY|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC, 0666) = 11 fcntl(11, F_GETLK, {l_type=F_UNLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0, l_pid=1519466008}) = 0 fcntl(11, F_SETLK, {l_type=F_WRLCK, l_whence=SEEK_SET, l_start=0, l_len=0}) = -1 EACCES (Permission denied) close(11) = 0 Am I doing anything wrong or is this some weird startup issue / race condition in the parentlock management? Thank you for looking into this. -Sanjiyan PS: I can upload the full strace file for both scenarios if needed. Thanks again. running on an xubuntu distribution "22.04.2 LTS (Jammy Jellyfish)"

All Replies (1)

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Try bind mounting the profile to the standard location where profiles are kept to avoid possible apparmor restrictions.

mount --bind <profile> ~/.mozilla/firefox/firefox3