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How to make "Say hello to a new Firefox" not appear next time I open Firefox

  • 6 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 6 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

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Hello,

I'm using Firefox 91.4.1esr (64-bit) from Debian repositories on Bullseye. Every time I open Firefox, a window with a greeting message appears ("Say hello to a new Firefox"), and it doesn't matter if, as asked by that window, I choose a theme or not. Is this issue related to my settings? Is this a Debian issue? Is it possible to stop that window from reappearing?

Thanks in advance. And many thanks for making Firefox (I've been using it for so many years I can't recall when I tried it for the first time).

Esteban

Hello, I'm using Firefox 91.4.1esr (64-bit) from Debian repositories on Bullseye. Every time I open Firefox, a window with a greeting message appears ("Say hello to a new Firefox"), and it doesn't matter if, as asked by that window, I choose a theme or not. Is this issue related to my settings? Is this a Debian issue? Is it possible to stop that window from reappearing? Thanks in advance. And many thanks for making Firefox (I've been using it for so many years I can't recall when I tried it for the first time). Esteban

Chosen solution

I'm very sorry, it was my mistake. I run Firefox from RAM and then save my profile to disk, but the script I use wasn't working because it found a lock file left in the profile's temporary folder. Thank you very much for trying to help, and apologies again.

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All Replies (6)

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Hi Esteban, I think that should only appear after an update. If it appears at every startup, possibly it has been added as a second "home page" or is a pinned tab.

On the Preferences page, Home panel, when Custom URLs is selected, there is a field listing home page(s). It can store multiple URLs separated by vertical bar ("|") characters. So that's the first thing to check. See: How to set the home page.

Pinned tabs have only the site icon, not the title, so that's easy to rule out. More info: Pinned Tabs - keep favorite websites open and just a click away.

Another possible explanation might be something in a user.js file. Firefox will read that optional file at startup, if it exists, and use its contents to override your regular settings. This article describes how to check for that file: How to fix preferences that won't save.

Any progress so far?

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You can possibly try Firefox from the official Mozilla server if you currently use a version from the repositories of your Linux distribution to see if it behaves differently.

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Chosen Solution

I'm very sorry, it was my mistake. I run Firefox from RAM and then save my profile to disk, but the script I use wasn't working because it found a lock file left in the profile's temporary folder. Thank you very much for trying to help, and apologies again.

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Thank you for reporting back. It's always good to understand the situation.

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Is there any way to permanently disable this message? Firefox updates often and it's already a hassle to restart it after every update. The message is 100% useless and serves only the amusement of the Firefox developers and graphic artists. As a user, it is nothing but spam. How can I disable this message?

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You can try to set this pref to false on the about:config page.

  • browser.aboutwelcome.enabled = false