This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Avatar for Username

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

This thread was archived. Please ask a new question if you need help.

Corrupted profile access on Linux

  • 2 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 10 views
  • Last reply by Shadow110

tvaz
tvaz
more options

Hello. I am running Linux Mint 19 Tara, and have been running Firefox without incident up until today. Every time I try to launch Firefox, I am greeted with a dialog box: "Profile Missing: ! Your Firefox profile cannot be loaded. It may be missing or inaccessible."

This pretty swiftly led me to the following help page: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-run-firefox-when-profile-missing-inaccessible

Which recommended that I delete and re-create the profiles.ini file in ~/.mozilla/firefox, and it would be automatically re-created upon launch. The behavior does not change, error still occurs.

Here are some basic commands I ran through after this (tvaz is my username):

tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ sudo firefox Running Firefox as root in a regular user's session is not supported. ($HOME is /home/tvaz which is owned by tvaz.) tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -safe-mode Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -no-remote -safe-mode Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -ProfileManager Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory.

      1. !!! [Parent][RunMessage] Error: Channel closing: too late to send/recv, messages will be lost


tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -noremote -ProfileManager Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory.

      1. !!! [Parent][RunMessage] Error: Channel closing: too late to send/recv, messages will be lost

tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $

Each time that the "Error: Access was denied" message came up again, I want to note that I got the same dialog box again saying that the profile was missing.

At this point I tried making sure that the permissions were set correctly on my .mozilla directory with a chown, but the permissions appeared to be set correctly to my user. I tried deleting the .mozilla directory, removing and reinstalling the firefox package, and doing a full purge as detailed in the first answer on this question: https://askubuntu.com/questions/16758/removing-firefox-in-ubuntu-with-all-add-ons-like-it-never-existed

Upon reinstall the issue continues to persist. I am typing this from Chrome. Any ideas?

Thanks, tvaz

Hello. I am running Linux Mint 19 Tara, and have been running Firefox without incident up until today. Every time I try to launch Firefox, I am greeted with a dialog box: "Profile Missing: ! Your Firefox profile cannot be loaded. It may be missing or inaccessible." This pretty swiftly led me to the following help page: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/how-run-firefox-when-profile-missing-inaccessible Which recommended that I delete and re-create the profiles.ini file in ~/.mozilla/firefox, and it would be automatically re-created upon launch. The behavior does not change, error still occurs. Here are some basic commands I ran through after this (tvaz is my username): tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ sudo firefox Running Firefox as root in a regular user's session is not supported. ($HOME is /home/tvaz which is owned by tvaz.) tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -safe-mode Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -no-remote -safe-mode Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -ProfileManager Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. ###!!! [Parent][RunMessage] Error: Channel closing: too late to send/recv, messages will be lost tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ firefox -noremote -ProfileManager Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. ###!!! [Parent][RunMessage] Error: Channel closing: too late to send/recv, messages will be lost tvaz@tvaz-linux ~ $ Each time that the "Error: Access was denied" message came up again, I want to note that I got the same dialog box again saying that the profile was missing. At this point I tried making sure that the permissions were set correctly on my .mozilla directory with a chown, but the permissions appeared to be set correctly to my user. I tried deleting the .mozilla directory, removing and reinstalling the firefox package, and doing a full purge as detailed in the first answer on this question: https://askubuntu.com/questions/16758/removing-firefox-in-ubuntu-with-all-add-ons-like-it-never-existed Upon reinstall the issue continues to persist. I am typing this from Chrome. Any ideas? Thanks, tvaz

All Replies (2)

tvaz
tvaz Question owner
more options

I apologize for the broken code block, the formatting here was a little confusing for me. 

~ $ firefox

Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. 

~ $ sudo firefox

Running Firefox as root in a regular user's session is not supported. ($HOME is /home/tvaz which is owned by tvaz.) 

~ $ firefox -safe-mode

Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. 

~ $ firefox -no-remote -safe-mode

Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory. 

~ $ firefox -ProfileManager

Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory.

!!! [Parent][RunMessage] Error: Channel closing: too late to send/recv, messages will be lost

~ $ firefox -noremote -ProfileManager Error: Access was denied while trying to open files in your profile directory.

!!! [Parent][RunMessage] Error: Channel closing: too late to send/recv, messages will be lost

Shadow110
Shadow110
more options

Hi I really do not know what you need, not a Linux person :

PROFILES

fyi for the future :



You can check if you have an "Old Firefox Data" folder on the desktop in case the Refresh feature in Firefox has been used and a new profile has been created.

You can copy files like these with Firefox closed to the current profile folder to recover specific data.

  • bookmarks and history: places.sqlite
  • bookmark backups: compressed .jsonlz4 JSON backups in the bookmarkbackups folder
  • cookies.sqlite for the Cookies
  • formhistory.sqlite for saved autocomplete Form Data
  • logins.json (passwords) and key4.db (58+) or key3.db (57 and older) (decryption key) for Passwords saved in the Password Manager
  • if you only have key3.db then make sure to remove an existing key4.db
  • cert9.db (58+) or cert8.db (57 and older) for (intermediate) certificates stored in the Certificate Manager
  • if you only have cert8.db then make sure to remove an existing cert9.db
  • persdict.dat for words you added to the spelling checker dictionary
  • permissions.sqlite for Permissions and possibly content-prefs.sqlite for other website specific data (Site Preferences)
  • sessionstore.jsonlz4 for open tabs and pinned tabs (see also the sessionstore-backups folder)

You can use the button on the "Help -> Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page.

____________________________________________________________

SESSIONS


You can check the sessionstore-backups folder in the profile folder for an upgade.jsonlz4 file.

You can use the button on the "Help -> Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page. 

   Help -> Troubleshooting Information -> Profile Directory:
   Windows: Show Folder; Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder
   http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Firefox

You will normally find these files in the sessionstore-backups folder: 

   previous.jsonlz4 (cleanBackup: copy of sessionstore.jsonlz4 from previous session that was loaded successfully)
   recovery.jsonlz4 (latest version of sessionstore.jsonlz4 written during runtime)
   recovery.baklz4 (previous version of sessionstore.jsonlz4 written during runtime)
   upgrade.jsonlz4-<build_id> (backup created during an upgrade of Firefox)

You can copy a file from the sessionstore-backups folder to the main profile and rename the file to sessionstore.jsonlz4 to replace the current sessionstore.jsonlz4 file (make sure to backup the current sessionstore.jsonlz4).

See also: 

   https://www.jeffersonscher.com/res/scrounger.html

So getting the full stuff and hope something is useful

SAFE MODE

In Firefox Safe mode these changes are effective:

  • all extensions are disabled (about:addons)
  • default theme is used (no persona)
  • userChrome.css and userContent.css are ignored (chrome folder)
  • default toolbar layout is used (file: localstore-safe.rdf)
  • Javascript JIT compilers are disabled (prefs: javascript.options.*jit)
  • hardware acceleration is disabled (Options > Performance > Uncheck to view)
  • plugins are not affected
  • preferences are not affected

TEST''''is issue still there ?

VIDEO AUDIO

REFRESH INSTRUCTIONS Hi, please try a Refresh but Note that this does more than uninstalling and re-installing does. Normal uninstalling does not remove some preferences which may have become corrupt. Please Refresh but do this 1st:

then

TEST....... If no issues then Extensions which need to be added back in 1 at a time and tested ..... Or it is your Profile : Make a new one and test ...:

If is your Profile :