Printing to Adobe PDF in Firefox

Synopsis: User tries to take a webpage in Firefox 21.0 and convert it to a PDF file using Adobe Acrobat X, version 10.1.7. Going up to File > Print and selecting Adobe PDF works fine. The problem occurs after the print dialog box comes up, the Adobe PDF printer is chosen and the print button is clicked. Sometimes you get the window to choose the location to save the resulting file. But, the end result is a freeze of the Printing progress bar, which leads only to force quitting Firefox:

Sometimes after force quitting Firefox, this Creating Adobe PDF window comes up on the screen and just sits there:

Only thing I can do with this window is close it out without any further incident. 

Troubleshooting steps: 

• Reloaded Firefox
• Reloaded Adobe Acrobat
• Ran Firefox in Safe Mode
• Attempted to close out problematic processes just before printing
• Tested with different Windows users profiles on the same machine

all without success. The problem could be reproduced with Microsoft XPS virtual printer as well. Found a forum post that explained the problem in a bit more detail:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/937032

The article references Firefox 15 with a link to another forum post about even older versions of Firefox. But, the symptoms are pretty much identical. Basically, Firefox has trouble handling calls to Windows File common dialog, which should be pretty routine. Of course, this problem doesn't occur in IE or Chrome. Hopefully, I'll have some updates at some point down the road (i.e. Firefox fixed the problem with an update). For now, I have suggested to the user to try a non-Adobe PDF creator in the form of a Firefox plug-in or try to use a different browser if he anticipates he needs to create a PDF from a webpage. 

TIPS & TRICKS: Thunderbird Fails to Update as Non-Adminstrator

I already knew that some software fails to update when running as non-administrator in Windows XP. Thunderbird is one of those pieces of software. Firefox also has the same problem. Another part of this problem is that both Thunderbird and Firefox, by default, run automatic Software Updates even as non-administrator. When Software Update runs automatically as non-administrator, the update will fail. The solution to the non-administrator problem seems to be to, periodically, run the updates manually as a user with administrative rights before the Software Update process has a chance to check. You can take this a step further and disable the automatic Software Update process in the non-administrator profile by going to Tools > Options > Advanced > Update and change to Ask me what I want to do.

To throw in an added complexity, Logitech webcam software also causes Thunderbird to not update. This is the error message I received:

"Software Update Failed. One or more files could not be updated. Please make sure all other applications are closed and that you have permission to modify files, and then restart Thunderbird to try again."

This fix is documented on mozillazine.org here:

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Software_Update

This seems to affect even users with administrative rights to install software. The fix is, basically, shutdown the Logitech webcam software and the update will run normally.

Good luck and happy computing.

RANTS: Firefox 3.x Printing to Windows Printers over AD in OS X.5

We have a printing system that uses PCounter to handle accounting for individual users. Our users use Active Directory credentials to authenticate through our server to the various printers. I'm working off OS X 10.5 and using Firefox 3.0.1.

Printing from OS X 10.5 through our system throws up a window that asks for Active Directory credentials for authentication. This should occur through any application. It worked fine in Firefox 2.x. Since Firefox 3 was installed, I no longer have that option, though printing from other apps still work fine. When the print job is sent to the local queue, the user shows System Administrator, not even the name of the user who's logged in. Something in Firefox is bypassing the need for credentials and Firefox is passing along some default information.

I've already verified this on 2 different machines now. I need to investigate further.

TIPS & TRICKS: Install Firefox Extensions for All Users

Looking for a way to install helpful Firefox extensions across all users? Fortunately, Firefox has a command line tool to do just that. I've confirmed this works for Windows XP and Vista. I have not tried it on other OSs.

Here are the steps:

1. Download the extension to your computer (don't do an install from within Firefox).

2. Make note of where the extension is saved (it will be a .xpi file).

3. Start a command window (Windows XP: Start > Run > cmd; Windows Vista: Start > cmd; for Vista, you may need to run the command window as an Administrator).

4. Here's the command to type at the command prompt:
firefox.exe -install-global-extension "path"
(i.e. firefox.exe. -install-global-extension "C:\Temp\extension.xpi")
I found that if it doesn't work, then you may need to navigate to the folder where Firefox is actually installed. Also, note that there is a space between firefox.exe and -install..., but no spaces between the install and the next hypen or global and the following hypen. Finally, the quotes are necessary around the path name.

5. There won't be a prompt of any kind, but you should be able to test it by logging in as different users to see the extension installed.

This link was helpful in my original search for an answer:

http://www.tinsie.net/Recommended/?p=902

TIPS & TRICKS: Firefox, Bouncing Web Pages

I came across an odd phenomenon today. Everything else on the computer being normal, web pages in Firefox would bounce up and down, much like if I were moving the scroll wheel up and down rapidly. The user came in and said that it started happening when he made adjustments to toolbars. Thus, I went in and adjusted settings for toolbars and found that the built-in Firefox Bookmark Toolbar, at least on that machine, required at least one bookmark in it or it would show the bouncing behavior. The other alternative is to hide the Bookmark Toolbar altogether.

RANT: Can't select links on Firefox (OS X) with Alt-Tab

Being a Windows user first, I've always loved being able to tab through to all the different links in a web browser. When I hit tab, the selection will highlight each link on the web page. I was also able to discover that alt-tab does the same thing in Safari on Mac OS X.

My gripe is that I can't do this in Firefox on the Mac. Is it that hard to do? I suppose if I had programming skills, I could go and try it myself. But I'm still learning those skills and would love it if this simple feature could already be available, especially when the alt-tab function isn't even used in Firefox.

To be fair, I can see that if it's added on the Mac side, then the Windows side would likely have it too. This would take away Windows ability to switch between applications. Trade-offs I suppose.