Komunitné fórum Firefox

Opening PDFs automatically with Firefox and, without any changes I might make, saving them with the download function in Firefox, actually ruins the functionality and data entry function of that file. Specifically this happens with PDF files downloaded from the (not all that amusing) PDFs from the FINCEN, (US Financial Crimes Enforcement Network). I do not see why and how Firefox thinks it is allowed to change files that are simply downloaded and saved on Firefox.

In other words, it seems that Firefox strips away certain "permissions" and/or "functions" (like built-in lookup, menu or choice boxes). This means that the file so downloaded via Firefox can no longer be used to properly fill in data, or to look up and choose data items within the file. (I see many times that ANYTHING having to do with "permissions" tends to be an intractable and unsolvable problem for software makers & experts, so, if you do not know right away how to solve the problem, it will probably take you several years to figure this out.)

The PDF in question is created by a government agency. If you have ever dealt with a government agency, then you know that they act sort of like Adobe or Microsoft: "They don't respond, or they do respond & say they do not understand, and if they understand, they are either unwilling or unable to fix the problem."

If there is a switch or option within Firefox, which lets me tell Firefox "Save this file exactly like it is received, nothing added or removed!", that would be nice. I just have not found such an option yet, and it would be nice if it might get provided someday.

I will share my browser data, but I am sort of convinced that a detailed question like mine will not be addressed within that shared data.

I am following directions that advise to go to Settings and change the option to open PDFs as individual files. Currently, they are opening as a Firefox tab. I have tried several times to make changes that stick, even rebooting. But PDFs still open in a tab.

Please help. Thank you.

Hi everyone,

I’m running into a frustrating issue where Firefox is opening PDFs in two places at once.

The Problem: When I click a PDF link, Firefox opens the file in a new tab (internal viewer) but also launches the standalone Adobe Acrobat app to display the same file. I only want it to open in Firefox.

Details: - Settings: My "Applications" setting for PDF is currently set to "Always Ask." - The Glitch: Even when I manually select "Open in Firefox" from the prompt, Adobe Acrobat launches anyway. - Timeline: This started happening 2 days ago without any manual setting changes (I think it might be after a firefox update? I might be mistaken)

- Troubleshooting done: I have tried toggling the action to "Open in Firefox" directly, but the dual-launch behavior persists.

Thanks

The attached shows the cursor only from today and free hand highlight from a March 2026 when working properly. The free hand highlight today does not highlight, only the cursor highlight is functioning.

PDFs seem to keep turning black when a pdf appears on Firefox and Downloads with Firefox. The preview of pages is still intact. Turning off hardware acceleration does not solve the issue. How do I fix this problem?

Adding this post for SEO indexing purposes, as I cannot reply to the original archived one: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1321170

The original post is one of the top search engine results, and provides a bandaid solution, without addressing the proper root cause, so I want to help whoever stumbles over this.

Original problem:

Dale 1/9/21, 8:26 AM

Firefox Developer Edition 85.0b4, macOS 10.15

If I Google for a PDF and click a link, I get the Firefox download dialog. If I select "Open with Firefox [Developer Edition]", the following things happen:

   The PDF is downloaded to ~/Downloads
   The PDF is opened in a new tab, with that new tab's location bar holding a file:///... URL to the downloaded PDF 

What I would instead like to happen is:

   The PDF is downloaded to some temporary directory where I won't have to worry about deleting it manually
   In whatever tab the PDF is displayed in, the location bar contains the URL where the PDF was (temporarily!) downloaded from 

How can I achieve this?

Not having the URL where a PDF was opened from is very annoying when, for example, I open a bunch of PDF search results to read and review, and I later want to share links to some of those PDFs. Best I can do to find their URLs to give to others is then to try and remember which tab corresponds to which search result, or do mine the downloads tab.

Contrast this with Chrome: I click a Google result for a PDF and the PDF just opens in the current tab with the URL to the PDF in the location bar. No dialogs, no PDF files hanging around in my home directory, and I can just copy the URL to the PDF the same way I'd copy the URL to any web page.

Thank you!

Proposed solution by original poster:

Dale Question owner 1/9/21, 9:27 AM Chosen Solution

Sigh. It appears the problem was one or both of the following preferences:

   pdfjs.enabledCache.state: false
   pdfjs.migrationVersion: 2 

I deleted both, and now clicking on a PDF just opens in the sane, normal way in Firefox that I desire.

Naturally I have no idea how those got set.

Hello: recently I decided to ditch expensive PDF Converter apps for my desktop pc as overspecified for my purposes. To date, I haven't found any guidance to use the Firefox Easy PDF Converter - usually required to convert Lotus Word Pro or MS Word text documents to pdf format. As a second request, can it be used to reverse convert e.g. pdf to docx etc. I have already added it to my Firefox app, but can't go any further. Thank you for helping. Geoff Pickerell (UK)

I read Firefox's suggestion to use the browser to edit pdf's and thought I'd give it a try, thinking I might be able to use it instead of my old Adobe Acrobat editor.

But I immediately noticed that there's no way to draw a shape with the Firefox pdf editor - a circle for example. The Help says I can select shapes from the Draw menu but the only thing that appears on my Draw menu is a line (see the attachment).

What am I doing wrong?

So i reinstalled my graphics driver yesterday, and after that when i open a pdf on firefox it only shows blackscreen. it didnt happen on other browsers(chrome, edge)