Incompatible extension 'Google Gears' in Firefox 3.5

Bug #480596 reported by Christian Wolff
172
This bug affects 45 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
gears (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Undecided
Unassigned

Bug Description

Binary package hint: gears

I got a error message on Firefox 3.5.4 (Karmic 32 Bit) which is complaining about the incompatible extentions 'Google Gears' (please see attached picture).

First I got this message with the manually installed Google Gears. Without using the one in the repository. I thought that might be the problem but I get this message also with the gears from the repository (which seems to be the same version). I got this message after the update to 3.5.4 but I'm not 100% sure if 3.5.3 was affected too.

The funny thing is that it is working. I tried the Google Reader offline mode and it did the job.

Anybody with the same problem?

# lsb_release -rd
Description: Ubuntu 9.10
Release: 9.10

# apt-cache policy gears
gears:
  Installed: 0.5.32.0~svn3391+dfsg-0ubuntu1
  Candidate: 0.5.32.0~svn3391+dfsg-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 0.5.32.0~svn3391+dfsg-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://ch.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/universe Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

# apt-cache policy firefox
firefox:
  Installed: 3.5.4+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.9.10.1
  Candidate: 3.5.4+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.9.10.1
  Version table:
 *** 3.5.4+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.9.10.1 0
        500 http://ch.archive.ubuntu.com karmic-updates/main Packages
        500 http://security.ubuntu.com karmic-security/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     3.5.3+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu6 0
        500 http://ch.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages

Revision history for this message
Christian Wolff (cw) wrote :
Revision history for this message
Stefan Lesicnik (stefanlsd) wrote :

Hi

I just installed gears to test and I get no errors. I am running AMD64. I will try install a 32bit VM and see if its a 32bit issue.

Revision history for this message
Christian Wolff (cw) wrote :

Hi all,

I updated Firefox to 3.5.5 today.
Same error.

@Stefan: It's possible that it's a 32 Bit only issue. Thanks for your efforts.

- Chris

Revision history for this message
Andrei Dziahel (develop7) wrote :

I'm experiencing this issue in both firefox and prism.
And yes, I'm running i386.

summary: - Incompatible extention 'Google Gears' in Firefox 3.5
+ Incompatible extension 'Google Gears' in Firefox 3.5
Revision history for this message
Juan Simón (simonbcn) wrote :

Same problem with firefox 3.5.5 (official version download from mozilla.com) 32 bits.
The extension Google Gears 0.5.32 is installed properly in Firefox (from http://gears.google.com/), but I receive the same error... ¿?

Revision history for this message
Rob van Vliet (rob-van-vliet) wrote :

Same with ff 3.5.5 on UNR (32 bits). Happens to when I install the version from google directly.

Revision history for this message
Rail Aliiev (rail) wrote :

Simon:
> Same problem with firefox 3.5.5 (official version download from mozilla.com) 32 bits.

Rob van Vliet:
> Same with ff 3.5.5 on UNR (32 bits). Happens to when I install the version from google directly.

These versions of Firefox (first case) and Gears (second one) are not provided by Ubuntu, so the bug is not applicable to Ubuntu.

Revision history for this message
Rob van Vliet (rob-van-vliet) wrote :

@Rail,

You must be mistaken:

http://packages.ubuntu.com/karmic-updates/firefox

and

http://packages.ubuntu.com/karmic/gears

or am I missing something?

Revision history for this message
Rail Aliiev (rail) wrote :

@Rob van Vliet:

Well, firefox and gears packages exist in Ubuntu, but if I understood correctly you tried to install Geras from Google, right? Google produces their own binaries, which may be incompatible with the system libraries.

Revision history for this message
leeshipley (leeshipley) wrote :

Struck this problem with 32-bit Karmic Koala today. Reinstalled Gears 05.32.0 code from Google. It reloaded its cache on my machine and carried on.
Had the same issue with the 64-bit Karmic Koala only a two days ago. The reinstall did not help. Did a search and came up with Niel Speen's patch at nielspeen.com/blog/2009/02/google-gears-64-bit. With nothing to lose, I installed his version (which appears in the add-ons as "05.33.0") and it appears to be working just fine.

Using Gears with Linux has always been bumpy. I hope that this kind of messing about and uncertainty is going to be eliminated in the future. Gears is an useful bit of kit for the kind of work that I do.

Revision history for this message
Roland J. (roland-jorz) wrote :

Hello to all,

same here, the message is in Romanian (system settings, sorry) but I have encountered this issue not one time, I have instaled Ubuntu for 4 time in 2 weeks and the error was present in every installation.

„Google Gears” nu se poate instala datorită incompatibilității cu tipul de construcție Firefox pe care-l aveti instalat (Linux_x86-gcc3). Vă rugăm luați legătura cu autorul pentru a-i semnala această problemă.

Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; ro; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091109 Ubuntu/9.10 (karmic) Firefox/3.5.5
Gears version 0.5.32.0

All the best,

Roland

Revision history for this message
sdrapeau (samuel-drapeau) wrote :

Hello,
I get exactly the same problem with gear, although it works correctly in Gmail, Calendar and Documents.
I also have i386.
Strange kind of bug.

Revision history for this message
shanen (Shannon Jacobs) (shanen) wrote :

I'm pretty sure I've been seeing the same problem for several weeks now, but only on one machine. It's a Sharp running the Jackalope version of Ubuntu, and is reported almost every boot, and sometimes twice, when it apparently tries to upgrade the extension version. The error message says to report it to the creator of the extension, which is Google, but I haven't figured out how to do so, and the Google search sent me over here... Seems a bit of a circle jerk, eh?

Not sure if it's related, but I do have Japanese capability installed in the system, including the ANTHY input system for Japanese and the Japanese language extensions for Firefox. I should check Firefox's language preferences on that particular machine, but I usually specify American English, generic English, and then Japanese in the third slot.

Revision history for this message
Rail Aliiev (rail) wrote :

Still have a question to everybody: do you use Gears from Ubuntu or Google?
Could you please check th output of the following command:
apt-cache policy gears

Revision history for this message
Juan Simón (simonbcn) wrote :

I changed to Karmic a few days ago and the problem continues...

$ apt-cache policy gears
gears:
  Instalados: 0.5.32.0~svn3391+dfsg-0ubuntu1
  Candidato: 0.5.32.0~svn3391+dfsg-0ubuntu1
  Tabla de versión:
 *** 0.5.32.0~svn3391+dfsg-0ubuntu1 0
        500 http://es.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/universe Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

$ apt-cache policy firefox
firefox:
  Instalados: 3.5.5+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.9.10.1
  Candidato: 3.5.5+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.9.10.1
  Tabla de versión:
 *** 3.5.5+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.9.10.1 0
        500 http://es.archive.ubuntu.com karmic-updates/main Packages
        500 http://security.ubuntu.com karmic-security/main Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     3.5.3+build1+nobinonly-0ubuntu6 0
        500 http://es.archive.ubuntu.com karmic/main Packages

Revision history for this message
Giovanni (aka Vanni) Totaro (vanni-totaro) wrote :
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primefalcon (primefalcon) wrote :

I am getting the same popup message myself every-time I start Firefox, and yes, gears does work fine so this message is annoying, I am actually thinking of un-installing gears based on the annoyance factor alone.

Revision history for this message
joehill (joseph-hill) wrote :

I'm getting the same problem. I've tried the version from the Google site, then I uninstalled it and tried the Ubuntu package, then I uninstalled that and built it from source. In each case I get the same message.

Revision history for this message
Carlos Eduardo Moreira dos Santos (cemsbr) wrote :

I'm having this problem with firefox 3.5.7.

Revision history for this message
shadyabhi (abhijeet-1989) wrote :

It wors if you install Google Gears from the repositories..

$sudo apt-get install gears

Revision history for this message
Martin Günther (launchpad-domain-the-phoenix) wrote :

> It wors if you install Google Gears from the repositories..

No, it doesn't. (See original reporter's comment.)

I also have installed the version from the repositories, but get the same error message.

Revision history for this message
Endolith (endolith) wrote :

The version on the Google bug report seems to work fine. Why can't you use that in Ubuntu?

http://code.google.com/p/gears/issues/detail?id=975#c50

Revision history for this message
knut (k-n-u-t) wrote :

i use firefox and gears from the repository (ubuntu karmic)
the error is shown on firefox startup but gears is working - at least for gmail

Revision history for this message
A.K.Karthikeyan (mindaslab) wrote :

This bug is bugging me for months now

Changed in gears (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Stefan Lesicnik (stefanlsd) wrote :

I've been doing some work on this and have compiled the latest SVN version. I get the xpi and it installs, but doesnt actually work (gears is not seen by google etc).

I have a feeling its xulrunner related (currently 1.9.1) and 1.9.2 should land in archive soon. As soon as its in, i will rebuild and test.

Revision history for this message
sirald66 (sirald66) wrote :

UBUNTU 9.10 WPU
FIREFOX 3.5.8
http://dl.google.com/gears/current/gears-linux-opt.xpi

Attempting to use Google Latitude with Google Gears to track by WiFi, the XPI download says: "Google Gears" could not be installed because it is not compatible with your Firefox build type (Linux_x86-gcc3). Please contact the author of this item about the problem.

Read the bug thread and see that Google Code has a hacked Gears package. But since Google is dropping Gears development for HTML5, Ubuntu should adjust the repository or flush Gears.

This is a limbo legacy bug.

Revision history for this message
Carlos Hernando (carlos-hernando) wrote :

Ubuntu Lucid 10.04
2.6.32-18-generic #27-Ubuntu SMP Fri Mar 26 19:51:10 UTC 2010 i686 GNU/Linux
Firefox: 3.6+nobinonly-0ubuntu6

Using the official version http://gears.google.com/ I get the same "Linux_x86_gcc3 is not compatible".

Using the repository xul-ext-gears (0.5.36.0~svn3423+dfsg-0ubuntu1) Firefox only starts the first time. In next run it just closes silently without errors. You have to remove 'compatibility.ini' (every time) from your profile.

Now I'm using http://gears64.org/ (0.5.34) and it seems it's working.

Revision history for this message
Motin (motin) wrote :

Workaround for Karmic:

sudo apt-get install gears

sudo nano /usr/lib/xulrunner-addons/extensions/{000a9d1c-beef-4f90-9363-039d445309b8}/install.rdf

In this file, change 0.5.32 to 0.5.33

This will make firefox think you already have the 0.5.33 installed and thus not try to upgrade to it (failing every time)

Since Google doesn't support gears any longer there will probably not be any new updates anyway.

From http://tuxtweaks.com/2010/01/fix-google-gears-for-firefox-on-linux/ adapted for Karmic.

This is IMO the only way to have gears in Linux, since gears in Chrome for Linux never will be available.

Revision history for this message
hansmeiser (hring) wrote :

http://gears64.org/

gears-linux-opt-0.5.34.0.xpi

funktioniert bei mir

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