Failure to install extensions
My installation of 32-bit Firefox 102 had been repeatedly crashing, sometimes for no apparent reason. I decided to download the 64-bit version of Firefox 102, uninstalled the 32-bit version, carried out a standard installed and all this appeared successful. I noticed that I was getting a lot of advertisements and remembered that I had had Ghostery installed as an extension in my 32-bit Firefox. I went to the extensions page, selected Ghostery and asked for it to be added. Shortly after that, I got a message that the installation had been aborted because the extension might be corrupt. I tried again and got the same message. I tried another ad blocker, and got the same message with that one; and tried a third with the same result. What is going on? I haven't changed any settings in Firefox since the standard installation, and the extensions were from the Firefox source, so how can the extensions be corrupt? If it isn't corrupt, why isn't Firefox installing it?
All Replies (9)
Hi EdingtonJD,
It is possible that (anti-virus) security software is causing the problem. Try to disable security software temporarily to see if that makes a difference.
RobertJ, thanks for your suggestion. While I am reluctant to expose my computer by implementing your suggestion (as far as I am aware, I can't download the extension and install it offline with the security software disabled), I also don't believe this really answers the question. The only thing that I am aware had changed on my computer was that Firefox went from a moderately unstable 32-bit version to an apparently stable (it hasn't crashed, yet!) 64-bit version. My anti-virus (ESET Internet Security) has not given me any messages about suspect malware or other problems, and it had seemed to have lived quite happily together with the previous Firefox installation / extension combination. The message came from Firefox itself, on the extensions page. I would have thought that if ESET was involved in some way then I would have had an alert from that software and / or a different message from Firefox (to say that my security software was preventing the extension installation) - after all, these are stock standard software packages that had worked together in the past, so why would they suddenly NOT work together now? I am now considering reverting to the 32-bit version of Firefox, with a clean install, to see if that is any more successful.
RobertJ, further to my earlier response, I did temporarily disable my ESET software and tried to install Ghostery. Ans again I got the message that the installation was aborted because the extension appeared to be corrupt. Any other suggestions?
Take a look through this article and see if there's anything that will help -
Unable to install add-ons https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/unable-install-add-ons-extensions-or-themes
I saw another User with the same issue had been using a custom config.js which was blocking. They removed the file and all was good.
The only item that appeared in this article and in my computer was extensions.json. I deleted that and tried again, and got the same message as before, i.e., installation aborted ...extension corrupt. I could not see a config.js, but there was a prefs.js - would it be safe to delete that as well?
I wouldn't delete any files. If you want, you can move them somewhere out of your Profile.
It would be even better to create a new "test" Profile -
Profile Manager - Create, remove or switch Firefox profiles https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-remove-switch-firefox-profiles#w_creating-a-profile
RobertJ, Thanks for your assistance over the last couple of days. Regrettably (since I have been with Firefox since it was Netscape back in the mid-90s) I have decided to move to another browser. It simply shouldn't be this hard to do a clean installation of software. I went through the information you pointed to about profiles but couldn't see anything that made much sense to me - after all, this was a new, standard installation and Firefox should have known what it needed to include in the profile. I could understand it if this had been an installation of some standing, when various modifications had been made to the profile over that time. I then decided to delete the 64-bit installation and revert to the 32-bit version. No problems in the deletion or the new installation, but as soon as I tried to install the Ghostery extension, I got the same error message; and again when I tried to install the AdBlocker extension. Again, thanks for your assistance in trying to resolve this matter.
EdingtonJD, This user determined that ESET is the culprit behind Add-ons being blocked -
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1381931 "Ok, so I paused antivirus, uninstalled firefox, restarted my computer, reinstalled, and now I've got everything downloaded. Re-enabled antivirus as well."
Robert, Thanks for this suggestion. Regrettably, it did not work for me. After reinstalling Firefox (with ESET disabled), the attempted addition of Ghostery was met with the same "installation aborted ... extension corrupt" message. I really don't know what else to try, and I don't want to waste too much more of my time (and yours) trying to solve this problem.