Completely removing a pkg

rpowell47 · Tuesday at 8:27 PM

I needed to absolutely remove firefox from pkg install. I carried out two commands: 1 - pkg remove and 2 - pkg clean -a. Then carried out a pkg install firefox again and found the same issues that were causing with the original pkg install. SO, I'm missing something. Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Maxnix · Tuesday at 8:34 PM

First of all let's clarify:

pkg remove delete everything that was contained in the Firefox's package (installed)
pkg clean -a cleared everything from pkg(8)'s cache (downloaded packages)

That said, if you still experience problems after removing, re-fetching, and reinstalling Firefox probably there is something wrong in your configuration, and pkg(8) has nothing to do with it, since it doesn't touch user specific config files.

So, instead of reinstalling Firefox, try deleting the $HOME/.config/mozilla directory.

mer · Tuesday at 9:17 PM

It may help us to help you if you tell us what "...the same issues..." are. Screenshots of any error messages.
Have you started firefox from a terminal in safe mode?

I think the correct directory for configuration is $HOME/.mozilla not $HOME/.config/mozilla
You can also just rename it instead of deleting it.

Maxnix · Tuesday at 9:38 PM

mer said:
I think the correct directory for configuration is $HOME/.mozilla not $HOME/.config/mozilla

$HOME/.mozilla is the old default directory (still supported); new Firefox installs put configs files in $HOME/.config/mozilla to support XDG Base Directory Specification.

mer · Tuesday at 10:06 PM

Maxnix said:
$HOME/.mozilla is the old default directory (still supported); new Firefox installs put configs files in $HOME/.config/mozilla to support XDG Base Directory Specification.

Interesting. I did not know that, probably because I've been using the same home directory for a long time

kirsche · Tuesday at 10:25 PM

Maxnix said:
$HOME/.mozilla is the old default directory (still supported); new Firefox installs put configs files in $HOME/.config/mozilla to support XDG Base Directory Specification.

Where do you get this information from? I installed Mozilla Firefox on 8.2.2026 and the user profile went to $HOME/.mozilla. I do not have a folder $HOME/.config/mozilla.

mer · Tuesday at 11:49 PM

kirsche I'm assuming you never had firefox installed before?
I'm seeing similar pattern: Waterfox and LibreWolf (firefox derivatives) create $HOME/.waterfox and $HOME/.librewolf

I'm on quarterly, 15.1 so perhaps the change is in latest?

victort · Wednesday at 3:09 AM

If Firefox installed dependencies, you should do `pkg autoremove `

Maxnix · Wednesday at 9:55 AM

kirsche said:
Where do you get this information from? I installed Mozilla Firefox on 8.2.2026 and the user profile went to $HOME/.mozilla. I do not have a folder $HOME/.config/mozilla.

The first version that supported this was 147: https://www.firefox.com/en-US/firefox/147.0/releasenotes/

kirsche · Wednesday at 8:49 PM

I installed FF during my transit from Windows 10 to FreeBSD 15.0 in 12/2025 - but I installed FF ESR, which is currently at 140.12.0esr. Maybe this explains the difference.

scottro · Wednesday at 11:13 PM

I also have Waterfox and Librewolf and I see what mer sees. Oh, and I also have firefox on here, and have $HOME/.mozilla.

No mozilla in $HOME/.config.

Another machine which has chromium does have a $HOME/.config/chromium.

mer · Wednesday at 11:16 PM

scottro said:
I also have Waterfox and Librewolf and I see what mer sees. Oh, and I also have firefox on here, and have $HOME/.mozilla.

No mozilla in $HOME/.config.

Another machine which has chromium does have a $HOME/.config/chromium.

I'm pretty sure my waterfox/librewolf were post v147.
I also have a few Ubuntu 24.04 systems (work) that do not have $HOME/.config directory.