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Firefox updated and disabled favorite add-ons used for years

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  • Last reply by AliceWyman

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Firefox updated this morning to version 43. Now it disabled my weather.com addon I've used for years, when I try to Run it Firefox won't let me. It disabled my Yahoo toolbar, I can re-install but every time I close and reopen it disables it again and it disabled my VIPRE Password Vault so I can't use it. Plus every time I minimize or close it, it opens an Options tab. Grr. Update why can't you leave my $^&*&^^ Firefox configuration alone!!!!!

Firefox updated this morning to version 43. Now it disabled my weather.com addon I've used for years, when I try to Run it Firefox won't let me. It disabled my Yahoo toolbar, I can re-install but every time I close and reopen it disables it again and it disabled my VIPRE Password Vault so I can't use it. Plus every time I minimize or close it, it opens an Options tab. Grr. Update why can't you leave my $^&*&^^ Firefox configuration alone!!!!!

Chosen solution

Hi wingrider6, something unusual is happening with the Yahoo! Toolbar, so I've leave that to one side.

Firefox 43 now enforces a signature requirement for extensions. You can make a global exception in order to use unsigned extensions that have not been updated to meet the new requirement. This may cover weather.com and VIPRE Password Vault for the time being.

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste xpin and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the xpinstall.signatures.required preference to switch it from true to false


Plus every time I minimize or close it, it opens an Options tab.

Sounds like the Options page was added as one of your home tabs. To edit that out, you can use either of these methods:

Options page

Switch over to the Options page, and select General in the left column. Toward the top of the page, in the Startup section, check the Home Page field:

Look for a vertical bar character. As a simple example with short URLs:

https://mozilla.org/|about:preferences

The bar definitely can be hard to spot with long URLs, but when you find it, delete whichever of these you find --

|about:preferences
|about:preferences#general

-- I suggest deleting the bar last so things don't accidentally get mushed together.

Don't click the "Use current pages button" or you'll have to start again. Firefox will save the edit when you tab out of or click away from that box.

about:config Preferences Editor

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste home and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.startup.homepage preference and remove whichever of these you see --

|about:preferences
|about:preferences#general

-- I suggest deleting the bar last so things don't accidentally get mushed together.

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Chosen Solution

Hi wingrider6, something unusual is happening with the Yahoo! Toolbar, so I've leave that to one side.

Firefox 43 now enforces a signature requirement for extensions. You can make a global exception in order to use unsigned extensions that have not been updated to meet the new requirement. This may cover weather.com and VIPRE Password Vault for the time being.

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste xpin and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the xpinstall.signatures.required preference to switch it from true to false


Plus every time I minimize or close it, it opens an Options tab.

Sounds like the Options page was added as one of your home tabs. To edit that out, you can use either of these methods:

Options page

Switch over to the Options page, and select General in the left column. Toward the top of the page, in the Startup section, check the Home Page field:

Look for a vertical bar character. As a simple example with short URLs:

https://mozilla.org/|about:preferences

The bar definitely can be hard to spot with long URLs, but when you find it, delete whichever of these you find --

|about:preferences
|about:preferences#general

-- I suggest deleting the bar last so things don't accidentally get mushed together.

Don't click the "Use current pages button" or you'll have to start again. Firefox will save the edit when you tab out of or click away from that box.

about:config Preferences Editor

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste home and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.startup.homepage preference and remove whichever of these you see --

|about:preferences
|about:preferences#general

-- I suggest deleting the bar last so things don't accidentally get mushed together.

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Thank you, thank you thank you, weather.com and VIPRE problem solved. The Firefox Option that is loading is in a "second" tab, my correct Home page is still loading. I think it is related to the signature problem as I also get a message across the top of the screen about the disabling of some addons, etc. I'm going to ignore that and maybe if the Yahoo toolbar thing is fixed that may take care of that also.

Again thank you for the help.

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Followup: The Yahoo toolbar add-on was updated on December 29, 2015. The latest version fixes an issue where the Yahoo toolbar becomes disabled after restarting Firefox.

If you changed the xpinstall.signatures.required preference to false in the Firefox Configuration Editor (about:config page) as a workaround only for the Yahoo toolbar problem, you should reset the preference back to true (the default value). If you also changed that preference setting to resolve problems with other add-ons that still show the "could not be verified for use in Firefox" message in the Add-ons Extensions list, please visit addons.mozilla.org to see if an updated version is available.