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"stop private browsing" and "clear history" under tools are gray and cannot be checked.

  • 6 replies
  • 225 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by bweusi

untgeorge
untgeorge
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Problems: - "stop private browsing" and "clear history" under tools are gray and cannot be checked - often, not always, I get a message that I cannot surf the web because I am offline; but work offline has not been checked and I have never worked offline - on several websites, such as ESPN and others, the print on one line overlaps the print on the next line and the print on the lower line cannot be read

Problems: - "stop private browsing" and "clear history" under tools are gray and cannot be checked - often, not always, I get a message that I cannot surf the web because I am offline; but work offline has not been checked and I have never worked offline - on several websites, such as ESPN and others, the print on one line overlaps the print on the next line and the print on the lower line cannot be read

Chosen solution

  • You are in Private Browsing mode if you see "Tools > Stop Private Browsing", possibly grayed
  • You enter Private Browsing mode if you select: Firefox > Preferences > Privacy > History: Firefox will: "Never Remember History"
  • To see all History settings, choose: Firefox > Preferences > Privacy, choose the setting Firefox will: Use custom settings for history
  • Uncheck: [ ] "Automatically start Firefox in a private browsing session"

See also:

Read this answer in context 👍 20

All Replies (6)

cor-el
cor-el
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  • Top 10 Contributor
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Chosen Solution

  • You are in Private Browsing mode if you see "Tools > Stop Private Browsing", possibly grayed
  • You enter Private Browsing mode if you select: Firefox > Preferences > Privacy > History: Firefox will: "Never Remember History"
  • To see all History settings, choose: Firefox > Preferences > Privacy, choose the setting Firefox will: Use custom settings for history
  • Uncheck: [ ] "Automatically start Firefox in a private browsing session"

See also:

untgeorge
untgeorge Question owner
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Firefox did not always automatically start in private browsing mode.

However i have followed your advice and, finding the item checked, unchecked it. Thanks.

untgeorge
untgeorge Question owner
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That leaves on question.

"on several websites, such as ESPN and others, the print on one line overlaps the print on the next line and the print on the lower line cannot be read "

Any thoughts?

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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Reset the page zoom on websites that look wrong: "View > Zoom > Reset" (Ctrl + 0 (zero))

If you increased the minimum font size then try a lower setting (default is none) as a too high value can cause issues like you described.

Tools > Options > Content : Fonts & Colors: Advanced > Minimum Font Size
Tools > Options > Content : Fonts & Colors: Advanced > "Allow pages to choose their own fonts, instead of my selections above"

See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Zoom_text_of_web_pages See Websites look wrong or appear differently than they should and Change the fonts and colors websites use

Menu differences: Windows: Tools > Options - Mac: Firefox > Preferences - Linux: Edit > Preferences

Modified by cor-el

untgeorge
untgeorge Question owner
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the "view>zoom>reset" step did nothing.

On my Firefox there is no "option" under "tool" thus i could not work with the second recommendation.

bweusi
bweusi
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I had the same problem! I went into the "Tool" menu-bar and clicked "Options", then in the "Firefox will" box scroll to the "Use Custom setting for History" then click it. Then un-check the "Automatically Start Firefox in the Private mode" button and then click "ok." You should be ok then. The "Private Browsing" and the "Clear History" buttons are unlocked.