Mozilla Seamonkey ..... Gone.

After being a happy Netscape3 --> Netscape4 --> Mozilla --> Seamonkey user for almost a decade, today I uninstalled Mozilla from my computer after spending three whole days with it in a non-functional mode.

I can't work out whether it was the no-script extension, the "upgrade" to Mozilla version 1.1.2, or something in Windows Vista itself, which did for Mozilla, or a combination of them all, but it had to go.

Welcome to Opera 9.2, haven't used Opera in more than a year, and it looks really good. Let's see how long this lasts.

I have used various Mozilla browser extensions for quite a while. These included Live HTTP Headers, ShowIP, and FlashBlock among others.

Only a few weeks ago I installed the NoScript extension, and had a great deal of difficulty getting it to work.

The first time I started the brower it opened, but none of the Personal Toolbar Folder links would work, nor would on-page mouse scrolling.

Next time I opened the browser, I got the error message: "This program must close to allow a previous installation attempt to complete. Please restart.". I could not get past this message.

After uninstalling and reinstalling things many times, I realised that I could actually open and use the Mozilla browser only if I ran it in Administrator mode. I then re-installed the program in Administrator mode and all appeared to be OK. It seemed to be working as it should.

I found the no-script extension to be very useful in blocking scripts that I did not need or want to run.



And then.... I saw that Mozilla 1.1.2 was available, downloaded it and installed it.

Disaster!

The status bar at the bottom of the screen occupied a quarter of the screen, and several things didn't work. After much uninstalling and re-installing of browser and extensions, I either had a non-functional browser or the dreaded "This program must close to allow a previous installation attempt to complete. Please restart." error message every time.

It reached a stage where that error occured even if the program was run in Administrator Mode. I tried deleting extension files, and re-installing the browser, many times. I also deleted the xpicleanup.dat file too, but that just took us back to the expanded status bar again.

I tried downgrading to Mozilla 1.1.1 and having no extensions at all, but no, now it doesn't work at all. I either get the startup/closedown error message in normal mode, or a non-functional browser in Administrator Mode where none of the bookmarks or links work, and with the status bar expanded with far too much height, and an odd bright red ^ caret at the bottom left of the screen.

Oh, and on-page mouse scrolling has died too.


So. There it is... gone.

I spent three whole days on this. I read hundreds of forum posts about similar problems and followed all the ideas and instructions previously given on those. I can't give it any more time.







[ Message was edited by: g1smd 06/02/2007 03:29 pm ]

I had another quick look at this today... I tried a system restore back to a point where the old version was working fine.

The restore point didn't make it work; and furthermore it also deleted most of the files that had been downloaded by Mozilla since that date, like the installer for the newer version for the browser for instance. That just disappeared. I thought that restore points shouldn't touch those?

I then undid the restore and I hope I am back to somewhere close to where I was this morning. Widows Update and AVG immediately went off and downloaded stuff, and Ad-Aware had an update waiting too.

ouch, sounds like your not having any luck

The status bar at the bottom of the screen occupied a quarter of the screen, and several things didn't work.

This happens to me in FF 2.odd quite often, I'm on Vista too... the only way I have solved it so far is by closing and opening it up again until it goes away

I have opened and closed it more than a hundred times; and uninstalled and reinstalled it more than two dozen times now. It is completely broken.

I even deleted all (as far as I can find) the associated files. In theory it should be working like a brand new install, but in fact it still picks up stuff from the old installation.

FF2 has started behaving oddly for me too. Every time I try to open FF I'm asked to verify that I want the program to run.

That's a Vista thing that is starting to get on my nerves. And, if I click a link from within Outlook, I'm presented with windows explorer and a message asking me to locate the link browser even though FF has opened the web page - after asking my permission of course.

It still hasn't put me off Vista though. I'm very shallow - I put up with bugs just to have the latest gadgets.

G1SMD,

Try this [link]

I've used it in the past to help with this sort of problem. Not sure if it works on Vista though.

Have you removed or renamed your seamonkey profile directory?

I'm on WinXP and no problems with FF mozilla. Vista must be messing with mozilla products. I'll be staying with WinXP for as long as I can. Me thinks that ole Bill doesn't like all the converts to FireFox and perhaps is making it difficult to run FF to retain MSIE users (I'm suspicious of MS).

You're so cynical - rightly so.

I already see plenty of Microsoft "make rival products fail" stuff all over Vista.

According to a few web pages I've read, people claim that Firefox does work on Vista. With that, I don't know why your mozilla product had problems. Perhaps you will need to completely uninstall all mozilla prods and install the latest firefox browser without that no-script extension thingy.

I have completely deleted the Mozilla folder in Programs and all related folders under Application Data, and Virtual Store, and anything else I can think of.

It still re-installs to a broken state.

You need to delete any registry entries too.

Just curious, did you “first” attempt to remove the program via ADD/REMOVE function within Windows? If not, that may explain the problems of re-installs to a broken state. Usually legit programs uninstall correctly via ADD/REMOVE function. Afterwards a clean install would take place without problems.

I learned some time back to always use the ADD/REMOVE function first before manually deleting directories.

I used "Programs and Features" in the Control Panel as that feature is now called in Vista.