Firefox help wanted!

[venta]

This morning, Firefox is flatly refusing to load any pages - including my webmail, and the pages I need for work. All I'm seeing is the little pop-up box which says "this document contains no data".

In an attempt to fix this, I clicked on the little red update-icon, and it claimed it was downloading a file, but then couldn't complete the installation process. Restarting Windows and Firefox, I tried to download updates again, whereupon it said it couldn't find the update servers. The little red update-icon has, however, now gone away. Help->About Mozilla claims I'm now running version 1.0.3[*],so I guess the update has worked in some sense.

This document still contains no data, though.

I don't think my connection's at fault, because the likes of puTTy can talk to the outside world. So far, the only site Firefox will happily load appears to be livejounal. Does anyone have any suggestions ?

[*] Which I wasn't running before, and which was the version I was expecting to upgrade to, even though this page http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/start/#mBody (which I can load) advertsises v1.0.4 as an upgrade (which I can't download).

Update: I don't think it's Firefox's fault, actually, since IE can't load any of these pages either. At least IE behaves sensibly/gives error messages/tells me it can't download things :(

Comments

[antoniosteve.livejournal.com]

I've had the exact same problem this morning, except that a number of my other applications couldn't connect either - my line of thinking was that it was an NTL-related lack of internet access - my firefox could load all the pages that I assume are cached on my computer, but nothing else.

[wimble.livejournal.com]

I'd blame NTL's proxies, which is why it only affects web traffic. Why LiveJournal works, I've no idea (given that even NTL's own status page doesn't).

[shrydar.livejournal.com]

My guess is that they've flagged the entirety of livejournal as updating so frequently that there's no point caching any of it.

[wimble.livejournal.com]

But google search requests don't work either, which shouldn't be cached. Y'think?

[shrydar.livejournal.com]

hmm.. perhaps.

Search results are probably still more stable than lj's "every page is a discussion board" model though.

All very strange. I blame tellytubbies.

[wimble.livejournal.com]

http://www.ntl-isp.ntl.com/ServiceStatus/

reports "Loss of Broadband in Oxford" (which is the wrong problem, since we've got connections, just not http).

[wimble.livejournal.com]

NTL's telephones support makes you jump through all the usual hoops.
Then the recorded voice message tells you there's a problem in Oxford (and surrounding areas). Just as you go "oh, so they know about...", you get through to a support person, to whom you repeat what the recording says.

They don't know when it'll be fixed and won't admit they know what's going on, other than it's maintainance.

[venta.livejournal.com]

I spoke to someone on the phone at NTL at around 9am, and they said our modem was connected fine, but there must be a problem with the router.

Since the router is in secutatrix's room, and I'd already woken her up to restart it once, I've not yet tried a proper restart of router and modem both at once.

I completely lost all connectivity after that, but things seem to have healed slightly now - back to most apps being able to connect, and LJ working, but no other web access :(

[wimble.livejournal.com]

Don't bother with your kit: whoever told you to look at it was a muppet.

They've wised up slightly: my tech support guy did say it would start working automatically. But why they don't just route all their traffic through the working proxy is beyond me: it wouldn't be quick, as there'd be massive amounts of competition for the bandwidth, but at least there'd be some throughput.

[zotz]

At one point NTL's Cambridge proxies were mostly broken. The fix was to find one that wasn't and specifically set it as your proxy rather than letting them assign a proxy automatically.

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

I've had similar troubles with Firefox's automatic update just not doing anything. Downloading the latest version independently and installing it does the trick, but that and the security holes has robbed Firefox of the "it's wonderful in every way" sheen for me (tho' still my browser of choice).

[venta.livejournal.com]

My other Firefox-update gripe is that it mysteriously loses some settings every time (in particular, it loses the page you use as your home page, and resets it to some Mozilla nonsense).

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

(in particular, it loses the page you use as your home page, and resets it to some Mozilla nonsense).

My homepage is always set to blank, and I don't get this problem on upgrades. However, on the last (or so) dialog of the install process is a set of check boxes for things like "create start menu groups". One of these is "set my homepage to some Mozilla nonsense", so you should uncheck this when installing.

I can't say for sure you don't only get this dialog if you do a "custom" install, so it might be an idea to do that.

[venta.livejournal.com]

You do get this dialog on a non-custom install. I unchecked the box. It didn't make any difference.

Mind you, everything was a bit screwy this morning. It gets one more chance to prove it isn't stuffed.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

and the security holes

One difference between IE and Firefox: we know about a lot of the security issues with IE. There's no such thing as bug-free desktop software.

NTL Status Update

[wimble.livejournal.com]

They've finally updated their status web page.

Posted at 11:34, and a problem since 10:50 (which is clearly not true)

Oxford Browsing Unavailable

Detail

ntl broadband customers in Oxford and the surrounding areas may experience a loss to Internet web page browsing. Our engineers are aware and working to restore service as soon as possible.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience that this may cause.

Re: NTL Status Update

[venta.livejournal.com]

Thanks - obviously, I can't see that, on account of Oxford browsing being unavailable :(

Thanks to some help from ach, I've now got Firefox to go through work's proxy, so I can get to the intranet. And IE doesn't go through work's proxy, so will let me read LJ. What more could I possibly want ?

Well, webmail, I suppose :)

Re: NTL Status Update

[wimble.livejournal.com]

on account of Oxford browsing being unavailable

Good grief. You'd almost think I'd pasted the text in for no good reason. Although I had assumed you'd be getting the copy as an email. Hah!

Does your webmail provider support pop or imap? Whilst that might not be your preferred solution, it'd be an interim fix (also, without knowing when NTL will sort out the problems).

Re: NTL Status Update

[venta.livejournal.com]

You'd almost think I'd pasted the text in for no good reason.

Er, yes... I was just being amused at the idea that anyone who was suffering from the problem couldn't know about it. Unless, of course, someone handily pasted the details for them.

ach produced the name of a working ntl proxy from somewhere (winn-cache-1.server.ntli.net), so everything is, in a limited sense, All Right Again.

Re: NTL Status Update

[wimble.livejournal.com]

If you try to manage your NTL account status from their web pages (to change your Broadband speed, for example), you need to enter your account name, and password.

If you can't remember your password, they've got a handy link which results in your password being emailed to your NTL account mailbox.

Which is protected by the same password they've already asked about. (Even the telephone support people appreciated this was a minor usability problem!)

Bypassing proxies

[waistcoatmark.livejournal.com]

I thought you could usually bypass most proxies by appending a question mark to the end of the URL?

Or you could use an ISP that doesn't insist on using "invisible" proxies to bugger up your browsing.

Re: Bypassing proxies

[wimble.livejournal.com]

The question mark will prevent the proxy from being able to cache the page, but the request still goes to the proxy first (which then, metaphorically, shrugs its shoulders and just passes the request straight through).

The problem in this case is that the proxies themselves are down (or otherwise incapable), so the request goes to the proxy and dies.