Problems with Study Tools on Firefox

[mevans]

I'm using Firefox 94.0.2 (Mac) and the day after Thanksgiving (Friday, November 26) I started having difficulty with the study tools. I have tried clearing all browser data and the problem persists.

What's happening is that I can highlight a selection (such as in a General Conference talk). Whenever I try to add a tag or note, the note/tag/notebook dialog briefly appears and then goes away without letting me do anything.

I tried it on Chrome and everything works fine there. FWIW, I tried it on Opera and it had the same behavior as Firefox. Due to frequent problems, I've completely given up trying to use the study tools on Safari, so I didn't even try it there.

Does anyone have the same issues on Firefox? I suspect the issue may be present, regardless of the platform.

[russellhltn]

Have you tried using private window? The fact it used to work but now doesn't sure sounds like it could be the cookie problem.

[mevans]

Have you tried using private window? The fact it used to work but now doesn't sure sounds like it could be the cookie problem.

That's a good point, russellhltn. I think I ran across this before. Even though I have cleared all browsing data, things on the church website don't work. I just tried doing a private session in Firefox and things on the church website worked as they should. That's lots of things. There are typically many hoops I jump through to log in and get study tools to work. But when I logged in using a private session, everything worked as it should without all the typical gymnastics required just to use the church website.

I don't know why clearing all data in Firefox doesn't make the church website work, but using a private window does make things work. Is Firefox forgetting to clear some things? Maybe I just need to be in the habit of always using a private window when using the church site.

[russellhltn]

Is Firefox forgetting to clear some things?

Apparently so. You might try clearing the cache as well, or see if there's some other options.

[jdlessley]

I don't know why clearing all data in Firefox doesn't make the church website work, but using a private window does make things work.

How, specifically, are you clearing all data? I found five ways that could all be interpreted as clearing all data but only two methods in Firefox 94.0.2 (64 bit) actually cleared all cookies without unnecessarily removing data/cookies for other sites.
The quickest method to reload web page(s) and bypass the cache to refresh possibly outdated or corrupted files (including cookies) is a hard refresh (sometimes called 'reload and bypass cache'). Ways to do this are:

1. Hold down the Shift key and left-click the Reload button
2. Press "Ctrl + F5" or press "Ctrl + Shift + R" (Windows,Linux)
3. Press "Command + Shift + R" (Mac)

When that quick method does not solve the problem then I clear all the church cookies with these steps:

• Click the 'Open Application Menu' (hamburger icon / three stacked horizontal lines icon).
• Click 'Settings'.
• Click 'Privacy & Security'.
• Scroll down the page to the section 'Cookies and Site Data'.
• Click the 'Manage Data...' button.
• Find the site 'churchofjesuschrist.org' and highlight it.
• Click the 'Remove Selected' button.
• Close the Settings tab and select the browser tab for the church website.
• Click the browser Reload button or press the keyboard F5 button.

There may also be some browser add-ins that could be interfering with deleting cookies.

[mevans]

To clear the data, I have been going to 'Cookies and Site Data' as you mentioned above, but instead of going to 'Manage Data,' I've done 'Clear Data' and have cleared everything, as I want to be extra sure that there aren't any other non-obvious cookies the church is using. After doing that, the church site still doesn't work as well as it does if I do a private window.

[sbradshaw]

To clear the data, I have been going to 'Cookies and Site Data' as you mentioned above, but instead of going to 'Manage Data,' I've done 'Clear Data' and have cleared everything, as I want to be extra sure that there aren't any other non-obvious cookies the church is using. After doing that, the church site still doesn't work as well as it does if I do a private window.

I wonder if cookies stick around for the rest of the session, even though they show as cleared? You could try signing out, then clearing cookies, then restarting the browser, then signing in again.

Just clearing the ChurchofJesusChrist.org cookies and (if they still exist) LDS.org cookies should be good enough.