4 "default" profiles, only 1 allows automatic updating and it's not my real default profile
I've had a problem for a while where Firefox tells me "Firefox is being updated by another instance" and the only way I've been able to get updates is by using the installer.
In my attempts to resolve this, I learned of the `about:profiles`. I have never set up profiles so I figures I should only have the 1 default profile but it turns out I have `default`, `default-release`, default-release-1`, and `default-release-2`.
Of these profiles, the `default-release` is the 1 that has my data while it is `default-release-1` that is able to update.
I would like to make it so that I only have 1 profile that has all of my data AND is able to update.
I already tried removing all the profiles accept the one with my data but that leaves Firefox unable to update. I restored all the profiles I removed and I am back to where I started.
Does anyone have any suggestions?
الحل المُختار
So, I used a combination of the two plus something else.
At some point, I ended up with 2 Firefoxes pinned to my task bar. After the reboot, the one called Firefox launched Firefox with my default-release profile but did not allow updating. The one called Firefox (2) launched Firefox, made me select a profile to use, and allowed updating.
After closing all instances of Firefox, the Firefox would launch Firefox without allowing updating and the one called Firefox (2) would launch Firefox with allowing updating.
So it seems the issue might have had something to do with with the task bar link.
I've now deleted the 2 task bar links, launched Firefox from the start menu, and repinned to the task bar. Everything seems to be working now!
Thanks to both of you.
All Replies (5)
Hi Nimbulaxan,
This thread may help you with that issue which I will quote in the following:
So, I went ahead and removed all profiles in about:profiles which I did before also but it did not work that time. I then closed all firefox processes in task manager. Rebooted my device and it seems to be working for now.
So, basically you shouldn't delete "default" as that's the one the background processes like the updater might use — even if it appears "empty" it's for launches that should not use your actual user profile so I'd keep that.
"default-release" is usually your user profile, while the –1 and –2 might have been created at some point in the past for some exploring and if they don't have any real data you might be looking into removing these two dupes once you get everything else working.
See if some of the profiles hold an old update lock that you can remove, and after restarting the current profile should be able to grab a lock of its own, in case it's able to write to the update directory. Some analogous steps are described in https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1940481#c34 to explain that with paths and images.
jbr said
So, basically you shouldn't delete "default"
Oh yeah, that's an important note right there. Thanks for sharing additional info here, Jan.
الحل المُختار
So, I used a combination of the two plus something else.
At some point, I ended up with 2 Firefoxes pinned to my task bar. After the reboot, the one called Firefox launched Firefox with my default-release profile but did not allow updating. The one called Firefox (2) launched Firefox, made me select a profile to use, and allowed updating.
After closing all instances of Firefox, the Firefox would launch Firefox without allowing updating and the one called Firefox (2) would launch Firefox with allowing updating.
So it seems the issue might have had something to do with with the task bar link.
I've now deleted the 2 task bar links, launched Firefox from the start menu, and repinned to the task bar. Everything seems to be working now!
Thanks to both of you.
I'm glad it worked out for you in the end.
Thanks for sharing your solution back in the thread. Let me mark your answer as the solution instead so others with the same issue won't jump directly into my workaround and read the entire thread in context.
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