Re: Firefox now saves files that I only wanted to open
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I just learned some good news: Firefox 103 users can switch the case (B) to case (A) using a setting. Could you make this change, turn off the extension(s), and test again? Here's how you can check on that: (A) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click...

Hey guys

Today I got so annyed by firefox’s default behaviour of downloading each and every PDF file to my disk that I went searching for a solution until I had the problem fixed. And it seems like I have finally found it. I have linked the solution but here is the explanation in short:

Firefox determines what kind of file type it is based on the content-type header it receives from the server. Another header is the content-disposition header with which the server specifies how the file should be handled. The two most important options here are attachment and inline.

  • inline is the default if not otherwise specified, and means the browser will handle the file according to the behavior set in the browser settings.
  • attachment means to always download the file

It is therefore possible that some pdf files are downloaded by force and others are handled according to the behavior specified in the settings. To force the latter in any case, you can proceed as follows:

  1. go to about:config
  2. change browser.download.open_pdf_attachments_inline to true

Thank you jscher2000 for the solution!

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/9785046

  • Eager EagleEnglish
    3•1 year ago

    Even with browser.download.open_pdf_attachments_inline set to false (default), Firefox already opens PDFs instead of downloading them, thanks to this setting:

    For what use cases is that needed?

    • PropaGandalfOP
      3•1 year ago

      For me it still downloads and then opens it in firefox. In the description it clearly says: Choose how Firefox handles the files you download from the web (…). And I don’t want it to download the file to my disk in the first place just store it in chache like a regular website.

      • Eager EagleEnglish
        2•1 year ago

        it doesn’t download them for me, unless I explicitly save the PDF that opens

        like this example.

        (akhtually it’ll always download in order to open it, I just mean it doesn’t create a PDF in the downloads directory)

        • PropaGandalfOP
          1•1 year ago

          Which firefox version are you on? I’m on 122.0b1 (flatpak beta) and changing these settings just defines what happens after I download the file. Also my download folder is set to ~/Downloads

          • Eager EagleEnglish
            2•1 year ago

            121.0 stable, .deb from Firefox’s ppa

            interesting

            • PropaGandalfOP
              1•1 year ago

              Wait do you download the files to you /tmp dir? Or do you store the files in the browser cache?

              • Eager EagleEnglish
                3•1 year ago

                my downloads dir is ~/downloads/ but Firefox doesn’t create a file there, so it must use a temp location for the PDF that opens.