How to re-enable FF 29 add-on compatibility check
Several weeks ago I installed FF 29.0.1 on two virtually-identical XP systems. I've been carefully maintaining extensions, settings, etc., in parallel on both systems.
Initially, my primary system told me if an extension in my search list was incompatible with 29.0.1, and presumably that's what I want to happen.
However, I recently installed a couple of extensions, that seemed to work okay. (I had downloaded the installers, and then installed them from the files.) Then, when I tried to install them from the same files on the second system, it told me that they were incompatible with 29.0.1, and that they could not be installed.
I want to re-enable the compatibility check on the system on which it seems to have been turned off. I've searched FF forums at length, but can't find any information on about:config or other settings that might affect this.
Izabrano rješenje
The error message I've been getting on one system when trying to install certain extensions is a small drop-down box from the green extensions manager icon near the upper left of the screen. However, it disappears when the "print screen" button is pressed, and does not appear in the captured image. I've noticed that kind of quirk on some other websites. So it seems to be impossible to get an image of the message. The message can be re-displayed, but not printed, by clicking on the green icon. However, the text of the message says, "<extension-name> could not be installed because it is not compatible with Firefox 29.0.1." Note: It is easy to reproduce this message by temporarily turning on extensions.strictCompatibility, and trying to install some older extensions.
In any event, the system on which I was getting the message is now behaving identically to my other system, apparently without any settings changes. Therefore, I feel that it was a persistent, but temporary, glitch that may have been fixed by a reboot. Therefore, the problem seems to be resolved.
Pročitajte ovaj odgovor sa objašnjenjem 👍 0All Replies (8)
Hello WizardGoat,
there's also another add-on for firefox which re-enable and disables this feature as well
Izmjenjeno od strane vanik84
There are some hidden settings that could affect extension compatibility. You could compare how each of your systems is configured here:
(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Click the button promising to be careful.
(2) In the search box that appears above the list, type or paste compat and pause while the list is filtered
(3) Check whether this preference (or any other seemingly relevant preference) is customized:
- extensions.strictCompatibility (usually Firefox is lenient about the maximum compatible version, but if this is set to true, many older extensions may be rejected)
There is a pref (or series of )that probably does not exist by default and if they exist you would set them to true to check compatibility extensions.checkCompatibility.<version>
I also note there may be a pref extensions.strictCompatibility which may have a default value of false
All the settings mentioned in the above posts are identical on both my systems, but I'm getting different behavior on each.
I did try setting extensions.strictCompatibility to true - it was false on both systems. But this caused already-installed extensions to be flagged as incompatible. It seems that this caused overkill, so I turned it back off.
But this still leaves me where I was: Cookie Importer 1.1 and Cookie Exporter 1.5 will install without error on my main system (where I suspect that something got modified), but are blocked on my backup system, which is more likely pristine.
I'd like to restore the default level of blocking on my main system, without the overkill from the mentioned setting.
If you see disabled or not compatible extensions in "Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Extensions" then click the Tools button at the left end of the Search bar to check if there is a compatibility update available.
You can try to delete the extensions.* files (e.g. extensions.json, extensions.sqlite, extensions.ini) and compatibility.ini in the Firefox profile folder to reset the extensions registry.
New files will be created when required.
You can use this button to go to the currently used Firefox profile folder:
- Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder (Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder)
Do you get the same error trying to install from the Add-ons site, or only installing from a file on disk?
I'm not sure I've seen that error before, actually. Would it be possible to capture a screen shot of it and attach it to a reply? This article has some tips on screen shots: How do I create a screenshot of my problem?
There are a lot of extensions (especially the ones that have an old history) that have an old maxVersion in their install.rdf file and such extension require an update check on the Add-ons server as is done automatically when you install the extension from its web page. You can edit the install.rdf file to avoid such a check. I usually do that to avoid issues like this.
Odabrano rješenje
The error message I've been getting on one system when trying to install certain extensions is a small drop-down box from the green extensions manager icon near the upper left of the screen. However, it disappears when the "print screen" button is pressed, and does not appear in the captured image. I've noticed that kind of quirk on some other websites. So it seems to be impossible to get an image of the message. The message can be re-displayed, but not printed, by clicking on the green icon. However, the text of the message says, "<extension-name> could not be installed because it is not compatible with Firefox 29.0.1." Note: It is easy to reproduce this message by temporarily turning on extensions.strictCompatibility, and trying to install some older extensions.
In any event, the system on which I was getting the message is now behaving identically to my other system, apparently without any settings changes. Therefore, I feel that it was a persistent, but temporary, glitch that may have been fixed by a reboot. Therefore, the problem seems to be resolved.