Firefox 3.6 won't work if user profile is accessed via a link

[Mike Durham]

Binary package hint: firefox

My home partition is accessed via a link, this prevents FF 3.6 from starting. If I move my home to /home/mike FF starts as normal. If I create a link to .mozilla in /home/mike FF will not work. Very strange!

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Sat Feb 6 12:43:12 2010
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx" - Alpha i386 (20100113)
Package: firefox 3.6+nobinonly-0ubuntu1
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=en_AU.utf8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-12.17-generic
SourcePackage: firefox
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-12-generic i686

[Mike Durham (mdurhamesq)]

Here is an strace in case it's of some use.

mike$ strace firefox
execve("/usr/bin/firefox", ["firefox"], [/* 41 vars */]) = 0
brk(0) = 0x9936000
access("/etc/ld.so.nohwcap", F_OK) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
mmap2(NULL, 8192, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 0xb77a5000
access("/etc/ld.so.preload", R_OK) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/etc/ld.so.cache", O_RDONLY) = 3
fstat64(3, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=85504, ...}) = 0
mmap2(NULL, 85504, PROT_READ, MAP_PRIVATE, 3, 0) = 0xb7790000
close(3) = 0
access("/etc/ld.so.nohwcap", F_OK) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
open("/lib/tls/i686/cmov/libc.so.6", O_RDONLY) = 3
read(3, "\177ELF\1\1\1\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\0\3\0\3\0\1\0\0\0000m\1\0004\0\0\0"..., 512) = 512
fstat64(3, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0755, st_size=1380932, ...}) = 0
mmap2(NULL, 1391016, PROT_READ|PROT_EXEC, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_DENYWRITE, 3, 0) = 0x110000
mprotect(0x25d000, 4096, PROT_NONE) = 0
mmap2(0x25e000, 12288, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_FIXED|MAP_DENYWRITE, 3, 0x14d) = 0x25e000
mmap2(0x261000, 10664, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_FIXED|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 0x261000
close(3) = 0
mmap2(NULL, 4096, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 0xb778f000
set_thread_area({entry_number:-1 -> 6, base_addr:0xb778f8d0, limit:1048575, seg_32bit:1, contents:0, read_exec_only:0, limit_in_pages:1, seg_not_present:0, useable:1}) = 0
mprotect(0x25e000, 8192, PROT_READ) = 0
mprotect(0x805c000, 4096, PROT_READ) = 0
mprotect(0x3af000, 4096, PROT_READ) = 0
munmap(0xb7790000, 85504) = 0
getpid() = 2070
rt_sigaction(SIGCHLD, {SIG_DFL, [CHLD], SA_RESTART}, {SIG_DFL, [], 0}, 8) = 0
geteuid32() = 1000
brk(0) = 0x9936000
brk(0x9957000) = 0x9957000
getppid() = 2069
stat64("/media/sda5/mike_lucid32_on6/mike", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0744, st_size=4096, ...}) = 0
stat64(".", {st_mode=S_IFDIR|0744, st_size=4096, ...}) = 0
open("/usr/bin/firefox", O_RDONLY) = 3
fcntl64(3, F_DUPFD, 10) = 10
close(3) = 0
fcntl64(10, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC) = 0
rt_sigaction(SIGINT, NULL, {SIG_DFL, [], 0}, 8) = 0
rt_sigaction(SIGINT, {0x804f5fb, ~[RTMIN RT_1], 0}, NULL, 8) = 0
rt_sigaction(SIGQUIT, NULL, {SIG_DFL, [], 0}, 8) = 0
rt_sigaction(SIGQUIT, {SIG_DFL, ~[RTMIN RT_1], 0}, NULL, 8) = 0
rt_sigaction(SIGTERM, NULL, {SIG_DFL, [], 0}, 8) = 0
rt_sigaction(SIGTERM, {SIG_DFL, ~[RTMIN RT_1], 0}, NULL, 8) = 0
read(10, "#!/bin/sh\n\n# Firefox launcher co"..., 8192) = 4569
pipe([3, 4]) = 0
clone(child_stack=0, flags=CLONE_CHILD_CLEARTID|CLONE_CHILD_SETTID|SIGCHLD, child_tidptr=0xb778f938) = 2071
close(4) = 0
read(3, "/usr/bin/firefox\n", 128) = 17
read(3, "", 128) = 0
close(3) = 0
wait4(-1, [{WIFEXITED(s) && WEXITSTATUS(s) == 0}], 0, NULL) = 2071
--- SIGCHLD...

[Sebastian (zimmermann+launchpad-net)]

Have you tried to delete compatibility.ini from your profile?
If firefox then starts correctly, this bug may be related to 518422.

[Mike Durham (mdurhamesq)]

Thanks for the suggestion Sebastian, it doesn't work.
If I create a new user in /home/newone and run Firefox this will produce a new profile and will always work fine.
If I rename .mozilla to .mozillaX and create a link to .mozillaX with the name of .mozilla, Firefox will not work (start).
If I have my home on a seperate partition with a link in /home/linktomyuserstuff it also doesn't work.
One other person reported this strange behaviour in the forum but obviously isn't worried about it as he hasn't made a bug report, as far as I can see.
Can you try renaming .mozilla and making a link as described above and let me know if it works or not.
Cheers, Mike

[Micah Gersten (micahg)]

Thank you for reporting this to Ubuntu. Do you have Mozilla Weave installed?

[Mike Durham (mdurhamesq)]

No, I don't have Mozilla Weave installed, should I have?

[Micah Gersten (micahg)]

No, I just found an upstream bug in the case of weave being installed.
I'll have to keep looking.

On 02/11/2010 11:32 PM, Mike Durham wrote:
> No, I don't have Mozilla Weave installed, should I have?
>
>

[Micah Gersten (micahg)]

Is this fixed with the latest Firefox package in Lucid?

[Mike Durham (mdurhamesq)]

Micah Gersten ,
Yes, this appears to work okay now with FF ver 3.6.3
Thanks for your efforts, Mike