Disappearing Text in Firefox 4

[Erenoth02]

Currently I use Google chrome, it took a little to get used to but now I wouldnt have it any other way.

For the record in my experience Mozilla Firefox causes a lot of virus problems, I deleted it myself ages ago and never looked back, over the course of my computer repair years I have found many PC issues with the use of Firefox, while there are may benefits from it users should be cautioned against using it.

As to the disappearing text problem, My sister experienced that with FF2 the only solution I could find was to delete everything from FF2 and reinstall it. I even had to remove some annoying registry keys.

[m0ds]

I have another problem with Firefox 4. I have to double click the icon on my desktop about 4 or 5 times before it opens, and then it opens all 5 new windows. If I double click once and wait, nothing happens. Anyone else got this problem? Or is it maybe just my PC? All other programs open first time, just not FF4.

[SpacePirateCaine]

Just for anyone that hasn't tried it, I was having some similar issues with FF4, and realized that it seems to be an issue with text resizing - most specifically with scaling down text. I will often ctrl+mousewheel to change a site to a size that I prefer (I like smaller text so I can see more at a time), but Firefox 4 seems to have issues with scaling the text - I assumed it might have something to do with my editing of the Cairo image scaling options, so that I could see pixel art without resampling.

You might want to just test out ctrl+mousewheel to see if your text reappears. The page might be larger or smaller on your browser window than you are used to, but until Mozilla's Firefox development team resolves this issue, it's probably the best way to take care of it.

And in response to Erenoth - if you're getting viruses, it's your browsing habits, not your browser of choice. Firefox has had some security holes in the past not unlike Explorer, Safari, Chrome and any other browser out there, but it's as solid as any other in my experience. I would suggest installing a better antivirus/anti-spam/firewall program and avoiding shady sites. Especially in the case of those of us involved in the indie game scene, there are a lot of shady programs out there, even malicious bits of code in indie games that the developer never even foresaw, or that get tacked on between their upload and your download. Scan every new program for viruses once it's on your local drive before you open it.

[Babar]

Scaling text is certainly one of the ways that the text disappears and reappears, but (insofar as my own system is concerned,) I don't think that's the main problem. I don't usually mess with the default size of the text, but if text disappears (here, or in facebook, or in something else), I scale it down, it comes back, I scale it up, it disappears, I scale it up again, it is still disappeared, I scroll down, and then scroll back up, and it comes back, sometimes it doesn't.


Just to test, I disabled ALL the plug-ins and extensions, and I STILL have this problem.

[TomatoesInTheHead]

Yeah, I first thought disabling the plugins would help, but it really only helps a little bit. With scaling it behaves like you say.
So, factors that influence the problem are, so far:
- plug-ins/add-ons
- zoom
- affected website (maybe invalid HTML/CSS code)
- other open websites, I think
- maybe even other open applications?
- the weather probably too...
- secret ingredient X

It's strange that only very few people seem to have this problem, I don't think my system and configuration is anything special... and it's unfair, everyone else should suffer, too!!1

[nihilyst]

It seems this problem has been solved (at least for me) with the new Firefox 5 update.