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When I click on my firefox icon on my windows desktop or in my programs menu, nothing happens. Why?

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  • Last reply by cor-el

jdleimert
jdleimert
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Firefox had been working just fine. Then a few days ago, I noticed the Firefox desktop icon would not open into the program. I uninstalled the program and re-installed it and yesterday it was working but now again the icon, or clicking on other icons driven by firefox or clicking on firefox in the program menu does nothing. Just nothing happens. My desktop here runs on Windows 7. Safari works OK. Thank you.

Firefox had been working just fine. Then a few days ago, I noticed the Firefox desktop icon would not open into the program. I uninstalled the program and re-installed it and yesterday it was working but now again the icon, or clicking on other icons driven by firefox or clicking on firefox in the program menu does nothing. Just nothing happens. My desktop here runs on Windows 7. Safari works OK. Thank you.

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cor-el
cor-el
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Start Firefox in Safe Mode to check if one of the extensions (Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Extensions) or if hardware acceleration is causing the problem (switch to the DEFAULT theme: Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Appearance).

  • Do NOT click the Reset button on the Safe mode start window or otherwise make changes.

You can use one of these to start Firefox in Safe mode:

  • On Windows, hold down the Shift key while starting Firefox with a double-click on the Firefox desktop shortcut
  • On Mac, hold down the Options key while starting Firefox
  • Help > Restart with Add-ons Disabled

A possible cause is security software (firewall,anti-virus) that blocks or restricts Firefox or the plugin-container process without informing you, possibly after detecting changes (update) to the Firefox program.

Remove all rules for Firefox and the plugin-container from the permissions list in the firewall and let your firewall ask again for permission to get full unrestricted access to internet for Firefox and the plugin-container process and the updater process.

See: