[SOLVED] Firefox’s graphics different depending on whether it starts normally or from startup.

[Oakems]

Hello, all.

I’m having a problem trying to get Firefox working properly. I have the tarball installed from Firefox’s site and am using Fedora 12 with KDE as the desktop environment. The problem is if I start Firefox normally, say, by just clicking on the firefox script, then the graphics will be rather crude; but when Firefox starts as soon as I log in (because I’ve configured it to auto-start) then the graphics will be nice and smooth. I’m having a hard time trying to find answers for this because I’m not exactly sure what’s happening? I think when it auto-starts as I log in, it’ll use... well, this is the bit I haven’t got a clue how to explain? I’d guess one time it uses QT, and the other time it’ll use GTK.

I don’t know why it’s doing this, and when it’s started normally and I go to shutdown most of the time it’ll come up with a crash report. There isn’t any difference in the way Firefox is being opened, the auto-start calls upon the same script that my shortcut uses, which is the same as clicking on the firefox script in the firefox folder.

I have a few images attached to elucidate the problem. I understand I may not have made myself very clear, but I’m having a great deal of trouble understanding what precisely is going on.

Any help would be greatly appreciated because Firefox can seem a bit glitchy when the crude graphics are in use. Like the mouse-overs which leave traces of the box behind when you move the mouse away. So I’m having to logout then back in if I’ve happened to close Firefox and want to reopen it... Thank you for you time and patients.

[jpollard]

You seem to be using a slightly different environment definition - exactly what
the difference is, I don't know. I suspect it is getting a different value for
the location of the firefox defaults.

By any chance, do you also have firefox installed via rpm as part of the regular
install?

[Oakems]

Thank you for your reply. I don’t have Firefox installed from the repo any more, but I think I did install it previously, then uninstalled straight away because I couldn’t update it.

Maybe there are some folders that have been left behind that were not removed when I uninstalled the older version of Firefox? The actual binary must have gone because I’d be told which version of Firefox I was using upon opening it. It usually has to check plugin compatibility when that happens also... Both my shortcut and the auto-start are pointing to the same file to start it, which is the really weird thing. I don’t see where the difference could be creeping in from, but like you say there’s clearly something that’s not quite the same?

(Edit: It’s going to be a massive pain if I can’t get this sorted because it’s not just the aesthetics that are affected, but also the performance of Firefox itself. All the menus and such, work so much faster and snappier than with unpolished graphics... I’m suspecting it’s because it’s using GTK instead of QT which is what KDE typically uses...)

Edit2: The crashing of Firefox when closing it is an independent issue. It has nothing to do with, err, which version is being used...

[Oakems]

Well, I managed to workaround this by starting Firefox via the "firefox.desktop" script that was made by autostart. This isn’t an elegant solution but it worked...

I think the problem was something to do with the, "Appearance" settings, and the fact that it would use different settings depending on how Firefox was opened. Inside that "firefox.desktop" script there’s a line like this:

Icon=system-run

and I’m guessing opening Firefox the normal way uses something other than the system’s icons? Probably GTK related which I think impairs the speed of Firefox somewhat. Maybe because I’m using KDE and not Gnome?

I decided to change the appearance so I’m now using QtCurve and it’s magic! The whole system seems much faster now. Is this possible, or am I just imagining the improvement of speed because everything looks much better now? It sure does feel a lot more snappier. Anyway, using QtCurve means Firefox uses the correct settings even when opened in the normal way, which is good. Problem solved...