You can make a difference in the Apple Support Community!

When you sign up with your Apple Account, you can provide valuable feedback to other community members by upvoting helpful replies and User Tips.

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Extensions - Can't see INSTALL NOW button in Safari 9

The Install Now button is not visible in the Safari Extensions Gallery. So I cannot install any extensions.


I'm using Safari 9 and El Capitan.


I noticed in a previous discussion labelled: "Extensions - Can't see INSTALL NOW button" the same thing.


Am I having the same .plist problem? IF NOT please advise.


Thanks.


User uploaded file

2.93 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, Mac OS X (10.6.4), null

Posted on Oct 2, 2015 8:56 AM

Reply
20 replies

Oct 4, 2015 3:31 PM in response to David Yarema

I have exactly the same problem, and it's infuriating. Have just spent the best part of two and a half hours fruitlessly trying to fix it — I've deleted everything Safari related, including the Safari folder in ~/Library/, the Cookies folder, all the preferences and cache folders. I have no malware or background crap that could possibly affect it running either, and I rebooted after deleting everything. Still no luck whatsoever.


I've accessed the 'Welcome to El Capitan' slideshow repeatedly but it doesn't do anything. I did log into another clean-ish user on my Mac and the Install Now button does show up there and extensions install fine. I have absolutely no intention of moving around my 600GB+ of user data in a fresh account for one stupid problem. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Oct 5, 2015 1:36 PM in response to Jefferson Regan

Sorry to hear about your frustration with the same issue Jefferson. I really don't think playing the slideshow has anything to do with this issue. My efforts to clear my website data and play the slideshow have been fruitless as well. We now know two ways the problem will not get fixed. Maybe we can define the problem better for those who might have other solutions.


I did the El Capitan update and my extensions were listed in my toolbar as you would expect.


For the first time since I began using a Mac (around 1991), I was infected with adware. The usual crap. It snuck through after I updated to El Capitan. My ad blocker software wasn't up to date yet. To get rid of the adware I used and app called Adware Cleaner. Did the job but I suspect it also erased the files that connected Safari to my User Account. (Preference files? .plist problem?) You may be experiencing the same issue. I don't know if user preferences work the same way in El Capitan. There has to be a way to re-connect our User Accounts to Safari again to allow us to access the 'Install Now' button state. I, too, do not want to do a clean install of Safari. Everything else works fine but I sure miss my extensions.


Does anyone know how the relationship between a User Account and the Safari extensions page works?

Oct 6, 2015 7:48 AM in response to David Yarema

If the problem is still there, try booting into the Safe Mode using your normal account. Disconnect all peripherals except those needed for the test. Shut down the computer and then power it back up after waiting 10 seconds. Immediately after hearing the startup chime, hold down the shift key and continue to hold it until the gray Apple icon and a progress bar appear. The boot up is significantly slower than normal. This will reset some caches, forces a directory check, and disables all startup and login items, among other things. When you reboot normally, the initial reboot may be slower than normal. If the system operates normally, there may be 3rd party applications which are causing a problem. Try deleting/disabling the third party applications after a restart by using the application un-installer. For each disable/delete, you will need to restart if you don't do them all at once.





Safe Mode - About El Capitan


Safe Mode Startup – El Capitan.

Oct 7, 2015 12:48 PM in response to Eric Root

This is an excellent idea! Did it. Didn't work. However, the whole "button missing" thing got me thinking that this could be an account problem so I checked iTunes. Wouldn't you know it... I cannot access my Account Info in iTunes. Also... I can no longer access MY Music in the cloud on my desktop. I can on my other devices. Something to do with my Account ID got erased possibly. The plot thickens...

Oct 10, 2015 4:42 PM in response to David Yarema

I fixed it!


I used a terminal command to check which files were being accessed when visiting the Extensions Gallery in my user folder. The only one that stood out was 'com.apple.security.plist', which upon investigation has to do with the keychain. After some experimentation didn't get me anywhere, I navigated to my user account's Keychains folder — Users/yourusername/Library/Keychains — folder in my home folder, went for the nuclear option of deleting everything in there and restarted. After that, I opened Safari and it popped up with the 'Your extensions have been migrated' message, which I took as a good sign (even though I already had extensions installed and running previously).


I've installed a couple of extensions and they work perfectly. Hope this works for you, David! Obviously, you should definitely back up the contents of that folder manually or with Time Machine before deleting it in case you lose anything important. Items can be dragged from one keychain to another, so the contents of it can be copied over to the newly created login keychain if necessary. iCloud Keychain sync some stuff but it misses a lot of stuff too.

Extensions - Can't see INSTALL NOW button in Safari 9

Welcome to Apple Support Community
A forum where Apple customers help each other with their products. Get started with your Apple Account.