Hi Michael

If this is happening by default you can change it: 1. Type "about:config" in the address bar and press Enter 2. Look for the following entry: browser.privatebrowsing.autostart 3. Set this value to False and restart the browser. If it is True, do not change anything and consider this add-on

There is an add on to disable Private browsing that may be helpful. https://addons.mozilla.org/En-us/firefox/addon/disable-private-browsing/

If there are any other questions, we are happy to help.

One possibility is this extension: Disable Private Browsing. I haven't tried it myself, but I think it would prevent you from accidentally opening a private window and getting stuck there.

Your More System Details shows that you have a user.js file, which Firefox reads at startup to override your previously saved preferences. If you don't recall creating this file, you may want to remove it. This article has the steps for that: How to fix preferences that won't save.

I tried the about:config thing. I'm not sure I understand step 3 since it says Set this value to False, and it was already False. But then you say If it is True, do not change anything. Of course it's not True, since it was already False, and you didn't say to set it to True. So maybe I'm missing something.

Evidently many share my hatred of the Private Browsing option and the way it works, since there are so many extensions built to kill it. I will try the add on you recommend and see if that works. But this is so basic it ought to be in the Options dialog box; then you wouldn't have to worry if it was compatible with the next version of Firefox. And they do come out so often.

When you're in Private Browsing, it's quite distracting as it changes many of the basic ways Firefox works, right-clicking and so forth.

I have downloaded and installed 'Disable Private Browsing'. To no effect, the choice still comes up in every menu. I have searched the info on it trying to find if there is something I have to do to turn it on once it's installed and I'm not finding any information on the addon developers page. No new entries in the Tools menu and so forth.

Start Firefox in Safe Mode to check if one of the extensions (Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Extensions) or if hardware acceleration is causing the problem (switch to the DEFAULT theme: Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Appearance).

• Do NOT click the Reset button on the Safe Mode start window.

• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Safe+Mode
• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Troubleshooting+extensions+and+themes

Add code to the userChrome.css file below the default @namespace line to hide "Open Link in New Private Window" in the right-click context menu.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/userChrome.css

The customization files userChrome.css (user interface) and userContent.css (websites) are located in the chrome folder in the Firefox profile folder.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/Editing_configuration

@namespace url("http://www.mozilla.org/keymaster/gatekeeper/there.is.only.xul"); /* only needed once */

#context-openlinkprivate { display:none!important; }

Note that your System Details List shows that you have a user.js file in the profile folder to initialize some prefs on each start of Firefox.

The user.js file is only present if you or other software has created it, so normally it wouldn't be there. you can check its content with a plain text editor if you didn't create this file yourself.

The user.js file is read each time you start Firefox and initializes preferences to the value specified in this file, so preferences set via user.js can only be changed temporarily for the current session.

• http://kb.mozillazine.org/Preferences_not_saved