If you use the Search Bar, you can clear only Search History by right-clicking in the Search Bar and using Clear Search History menu-item. Not 100% sure if that also clears the "history" in about:home, but please try that first.

If not, you can clear your Form and Search History under Firefox button > History -> Clear Recent History = then make sure that only Form and Search History is check-marked. Otherwise you'll end up deleting all your Recent History. Unfortunately you can't clear Search History alone from there. That I know will clear the accumulated history of searches in the about:home search box.

I did that, nothing changed. I don't see how search history is related to my issue, I think it's a bit more complicated than that. The bottom buttons (downloads, history, etc.) on the about:home work, only the "search" button does nothing. I think there's an issue with maybe the html file or with the java script but I don't know how to troubleshoot those.

Sorry, I misread your problem.

Another user reported that TabMix Plus was causings a similar issue for him; the Search Box was dead.
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/946650?esab=a&s=Firefox+18+about%3Ahome+search&r=6&as=s

Any chance you have TabMix Plus installed?

The only tab addon that I have installed is New Tab Plus. I use about:home only as my start page. Tried with addons disabled with no effect.

What is the values of the browser.search.defaultenginename pref on the about:config page?

That search engine is used in current Firefox versions for the about:home page.

browser.search.defaultenginename: Status - User set / Type - string / Value - Web Search

I noticed that my work pc firefox has the google logo on the left of the search box, while on my personal one that's missing. Maybe an issue with the search engine?

I had reset the value of browser.search.defaultenginename to Google and it's now working. Seems like something changed that value. Thanks for your help Cor-el !!

Please someone explain properly how to do this, we are not all tekkies!

thanks davo

ps This has happened only since FF update two days ago but is V annoying

Type about:config in the location (address) bar and press the "Enter" key to open the about:config page, just like you open a website by typing the URL in the location bar.

• If you see a warning message then you can confirm that you want to access the about:config page.

• use the Search bar at the top of the about:config page to locate preferences more easily
• preferences that have been modified and do not have the default value show as bold (user set)
• preferences that are user set (bold) can be reset to the default value via the right-click context menu
• preferences can be changed via the right-click context menu: Modify (String or Integer) or Toggle (Boolean) or by double-clicking the line with the pref
• preferences can be created via the right-click context menu: New -> String, Integer, Boolean

See also:

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/about:config

In this case you can check the value of the browser.search.defaultenginename pref, but you probably can do this in a much easier way with the SearchReset extension.

You can use the SearchReset extension to reset some preferences to the default values.

• https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/searchreset/

Note that the SearchReset extension only runs once and then uninstalls automatically, so it won't show on the "Firefox > Add-ons" page (about:addons).

Hi cor-el

There was a mstone override value of 20.1.01again today disabling the search

davo

I think I need to go back one version

Both overrides changing, getting fed up now. No new software or add-ons updates to cause this

The browser.startup.homepage_override.mstone pref will always store the current Firefox version.
A reset of this pref makes Firefox reset some specific files in the profile folder just as happens when Firefox gets updated, so no worries if you se the same value appearing again.
It shouldn't be necessary to perform this action frequently as that may indicate that something else is wrong and you may have security software causing problems.

Hi cor-el

Been thinking I recently switched from Norton to a trial of bitdefender. Strangely, I have a google toolbar on at the top and this is not affected

davo

The search bar on the about:home page uses the browser.search.defaultenginename pref, so you can check if this pref still has the default value Google.

You can check if you still have the XML files of the default search engines including Google in the searchplugins folder in Firefox program folder.

You can delete the search.json file and a possible search.sqlite file in the Firefox profile folder.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Firefox

Firefox will rebuild the search.json file from the default search engines in the searchplugins folder in the Firefox program folder and the searchplugins folder in the Firefox profile folder.

Hi cor-el

yes, google is still there.

deleted json, other one not there.

Switched to Kaspersky trial but problem still persists. Switched to version 20, same thing

Only noscript has updated of my add ons

davo