Hi ViperEye, do you mean shortcuts on your Windows desktop? What happens when you try to double-click them? For example:

• Nothing happens
• Error message (what is the error message?)
• Webpage shortcuts call up Firefox but the page doesn't load
• Something else

I keep getting "links not allowed" but my response did not contain any. So I'm working on getting my response to you.

Hi ViperEye, there's a bug in the new link filter so anything that has word-dot-word is blocked. You can substitute a comma or dash for the periods in that case (like google,com).

The commas didn't work so I substituted Home for it and eliminated your name, thinking that may be a link. No go.

I will send it as an Image.

I'm really sorry, we're all trying to adapt to this temporary anti-scam measure. Maybe look for everywhere in your text where there's a period (you can use Ctrl+F to Find . and then click Highlight All on the Find bar) and add a space after it.

Got the image. Does the address appear in the address bar, but the page is blank?

Hopefully this is a temporary problem. Do either of these help:

(1) Clear Firefox's Cache

Sometimes the old files in the cache cause problems loading updated pages on sites. See: How to clear the Firefox cache

If you have a large hard drive, this might take a few minutes.

Any improvement?

(2) Remove the site's cookies (save any pending work first). While viewing a page on the site, click the lock icon at the left end of the address bar. After a moment, a "Clear Cookies and Site Data" button should appear at the bottom. Go ahead and click that.

In the dialog that opens, you will see one or more matches to the current address so you can remove the site's cookies individually without affecting other sites.

Then try reloading the page. Does that help?

JScher Removing the cache seems to have done it At least I signed out and Shortcutted back in 3 times consecutively Thanks big bunches JSchur (Jake Schur)

Jake, thanks for reporting back. I'm happy when you just have to clear temporary data to solve a problem.

Hi J, Just to follow up; thought you'd find this interesting. The clearing of data worked about 3 times and then failed. The following I got off a Microsoft website. Seems as though Google and Microsoft are at each other's throats.

How to run Google apps from Windows Desktop Although Google retired its Chrome App Launcher, you’re still able to run your favorite Chrome apps from the desktop — you just need to perform a simple trick. To make your Google apps accessible from Desktop, do the following: Open a Google app within browser (Google Play Music, Gmail Inbox, Google Photos, basically any service you want) Go to Tools > More tools Go to Add to Desktop, and the following window will appear chrome apps desktop Rename your app, and check “Mark as window” Click OK, and you’re good to go Once you save your desired app to Desktop, you’ll be able to use it just like you use other apps in Windows. It will open in its own window separately from Google Chrome, but the user experience will be same as in the browser. You can also pin the shortcut to the taskbar or the Start Menu just as you would with any other regular Windows app.

I applied it to Gmail and Walmart and both seem to be working well. Jake Schur

I see a similar issue where desktop shortcuts can't load sites running Discourse software (e.g., discourse.mozilla.org). All other shortcuts work as expected. Clearing cache, cookies, site preferences etc. does the trick only for the next session.

This only happens if Firefox is closed. If Firefox is already open shortcuts for Discourse sites work as expected. To put it another way, a shortcut pointing to a Discourse site can't open Firefox and load the site at the same time if there were previous sessions. The Firefox page will be blank with no URL in the address bar.

Possibly it's a Firefox or Windows issue, although the common denominator is Discourse and presumably its session cookies. Weirder still, the problem does not occur on a different computer and all shortcuts work as expected. Both systems run Windows 10 Home build 2004 with Firefox 81.0.

The problem can be duplicated on the problem computer using a different Firefox profile and Windows login. It begins the moment the default browser changes from Edge to Firefox.

Chewy, Interesting. I had convinced myself there was Microsoft manipulation going down and I still think that.

Correction to my earlier post: The shortcut quirk I described can be reproduced on a different Windows computer. The difference is that two Discourse sites don't load properly unless Firefox is running, but another Discourse site opens normally every time. Since my first post Firefox updated to 81.0.1.

I had convinced myself there was Microsoft manipulation going down and I still think that.

Your suspicions are justified but I think it's something more accidental related to Discourse session cookies. The problem isn't a show stopper but it's weird and annoying enough to mention in case it turns out to be a Firefox bug.

Makes sense.