why does firefox makes multiple profiles
My name is Mike from the helpdesk of YER. We have one user with the same problem over and over again. Our employees have a roaming profile with multiple browsers, but he uses Firefox wich is causing a problem.
There is a datalimit on our user profiles. The problem is that Firefox uses all the space from the user profile. This causes a storage space error every two days. To solve it, I open Firefox profile manager, multiple profiles are visible. So I delete the non-used profiles. But this is temporarily, because within a few days, the user contacts us with the same problem. I also tried to move the profile to his documents with the profile manager to free space, also this didn't solve the problem because Firefox makes new profiles over and over again.
This user is the only one with this problem, and we cannot find a solution. We thought maybe it has something to do with synchronisation between multiple devices, but he only uses his Firefox profile on his work computer.
I hope you can help me solving this problem. Maybe you can explain why Firefox is creating multiple profiles, or maybe we can change the Firefox profile path, for all the profiles incl. new ones that are created.
Thank you!
Chosen solution
What is the content of the profiles.ini file?
Sounds that the profile path stored in the file isn't recognized.
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Plezo wrote:
Firefox makes new profiles over and over again.
Check the permissions for the profile folder.
You can use Process Monitor to check what each program is doing. Look for things like DENIED file or folder errors for firefox.exe
Plezo wrote:
maybe we can change the Firefox profile path, for all the profiles incl. new ones that are created.
I'm reasonably sure there's no proper way to change where Firefox creates new profiles by default. Usually, Firefox stores profiles in %AppData%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles and some additional data in %LocalAppData%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles. Double-check these locations to ensure they don't differ in your setup. You can create symbolic links so that the files and subfolders end up being stored somewhere else.
One possible workaround is to run Firefox off a USB Flash drive, assuming the user is allowed to do that.
It could also be possible to show the user how to open Firefox with the Profile manager to choose the correct profile.
Chosen Solution
What is the content of the profiles.ini file?
Sounds that the profile path stored in the file isn't recognized.
Plezo said
My name is Mike from the helpdesk of YER. We have one user with the same problem over and over again. Our employees have a roaming profile with multiple browsers, but he uses Firefox wich is causing a problem. There is a datalimit on our user profiles. The problem is that Firefox uses all the space from the user profile. This causes a storage space error every two days. To solve it, I open Firefox profile manager, multiple profiles are visible. So I delete the non-used profiles. But this is temporarily, because within a few days, the user contacts us with the same problem. I also tried to move the profile to his documents with the profile manager to free space, also this didn't solve the problem because Firefox makes new profiles over and over again. This user is the only one with this problem, and we cannot find a solution. We thought maybe it has something to do with synchronisation between multiple devices, but he only uses his Firefox profile on his work computer. I hope you can help me solving this problem. Maybe you can explain why Firefox is creating multiple profiles, or maybe we can change the Firefox profile path, for all the profiles incl. new ones that are created. Thank you!
I also have been having this problem for way to long to the point I have removed Firefox so many times and have even completely wiped my computer out and did a factory full restore (which I am still upset about) .. NOW again i delete FIREFOX ... I go thru the computer ..hidden files and all and totally delete any and every thing the is related to Mozilla and Firefox.. including the OLD Firefox file it creates even if you do a reset... Now I have two issues.. when you restore a system,, you are given a complete NEW user profile,,, thanks to Firefox pulling from what must be your records.. EVERY past user ID that this computer ever had is back on my system and has permissions on important files under UNKNOWN USER.. and firefox has created tons of dupt files.. example ...I ran to see why system again was slow CCleaner disk analyzer and wow there is over 85,000 files created by Firefox which include duplicating all program files and over (I stopped counting after a certain number) thousands of c:\users\Robie\AppData\local\mozilla\firefox\profile\...\cache2 files every 4 minutes for since i reloaded.. and all system files (only important ones) and links to the old profiles that were infected and/or corrupt over 84k of this ...these are just under the OTHER catagory.. WHY is this repeating over and over