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My keyboard will not allow me to type in firefox. When I press "H" it opens Help drop down, etc. How do I turn this off so I can type again ?

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  • Last reply by cor-el

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I am having an occasional problem that has just started when using Firefox. When I press letter "H" it opens the help menu "B" opens bookmarks menu "T" opens tools menu, etc. When I try to type in the address bar a site that begins with a letter such as this I have to sometimes click the address bar again to make it able to put in the web address. It wasn't happening two days ago and I haven't made any changes to add ons or extensions. I haven't created any shortcuts or keystrokes.

I am using Firefox 53.0.3 64-bit version. I have never had this happen in the past. Thanks.

I am having an occasional problem that has just started when using Firefox. When I press letter "H" it opens the help menu "B" opens bookmarks menu "T" opens tools menu, etc. When I try to type in the address bar a site that begins with a letter such as this I have to sometimes click the address bar again to make it able to put in the web address. It wasn't happening two days ago and I haven't made any changes to add ons or extensions. I haven't created any shortcuts or keystrokes. I am using Firefox 53.0.3 64-bit version. I have never had this happen in the past. Thanks.

All Replies (9)

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Hi   !
It is possible that some of the status keys have the wrong state and Firefox sees them as still pressed.

Try to press all the status keys   (Shift, Ctrl, Alt)   a few times to see if that helps .

If it doesn't help, then close and restart Firefox or reboot the computer.

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Thank you for responding. I have tried all of the steps you recommended a couple of times and the issue is still happening.

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Did you try to reboot the computer?

Do you have multiple keyboard layouts installed?

It is possible that you have switched the keyboard layout by accident.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/258824 How to change your keyboard layout

Windows remembers the keyboard layout setting per application and you may have changed the keyboard layout by accident via a keyboard shortcut.


If that's not it either, let's try starting Firefox in Safe Mode :

If Firefox is not running : Hold down the Shift key when starting Firefox. If Firefox is running : 3-bar menu => ' ? ' (at the bottom of the dropdown) => 'Restart with Add-ons disabled'. Then OK the restart. A small dialog should appear. Click 'Start in Safe Mode' ( not 'Refresh' !)

See : Troubleshoot Fireox issues using Safe Mode

Also : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/troubleshoot-extensions-themes-to-fix-problems

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Do the other modifier key work as expected when this happens?

Boot the computer in Windows Safe mode with network support to see if that has effect in case security software is causing problems.

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Happy112,

I do not have multiple keyboard layouts. I am using Windows 10 and when I put that command in the start menu the box that pops up does not have a tab for keyboards.

I started it in safe mode and it did not seem to occur. But in safe mode I do not have the drop down tabs that I have while I am using Firefox in regular mode. I have had the tabs activated for a long, long time and this is the first time it has happened.

I have included a screen shot to show how the drop downs look in my Firefox where they are not there in Safe Mode.

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You say that in Safe Mode the problem does not occur. Do you have any add-ons installed  ? They're disabled in Safe Mode. If you do have any add-ons, disable them and then re-enable them, till you find the culprit.

(Did you try to reboot your computer  ?)

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Are you using Classic Theme Restorer?

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Happy112,

I do have many addons installed. I will have to try disabling them one by one. I hadn't tried that yet as I wanted to see if it was something else.

I did do a reboot, twice since yesterday.

Cor-el,

I DO have Classic Theme Restorer installed. cor-el said

Are you using Classic Theme Restorer?

Anything in particular about that add-on?

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  • if you have many extensions then first enabled half of the extensions to test which half has the problem.
  • continue to divide the bad half that still has the issue until you find which one is causing the problem.

If this started recently then start with extensions have have recently installed or updated.