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Possible to get Skype 8 up and running on XP?


NojusK

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@Dave-H, @Mathwiz

I conducted several tests with Firefox ESR 52.9.1 x86 (on Windows Vista SP2 x86) and I concluded that I had no issue whatsoever loggin' in and connecting to a skype account, starting from the web.skype.com URI :thumbup

First, loading the URL with my dirty profile, without a SSUAO:

zABBjrT.jpg

As expected, I get the "Browser not supported" message :angry: .

As posted elsewhere in these forums, in my FxESR 52.9.1 copy I'm not using any extensions to apply SSUAOs, instead I have implemented the two .js files manual patch, to re-initialise the dormant relevant browser module.

As such, in about:config I simply created the following string user pref:

general.useragent.override.skype.com;Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; WOW64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/73.0.3683.86 Safari/537.36

BTW, @Mathwiz is right:

1 hour ago, Mathwiz said:

the SSUAO for skypeassets.com doesn't seem to be necessary after all. I just tried without it and was still able to log in.

Also, I did not have to create a SSUAO for the "*.live.com" domain, either...

Just trying anew the web.skype.com URL, I am now presented with the login.live.com sign-in prompt:

OEGjvp7.jpg

After the skype username and skype password have been (successively) successfully input, I had no issues connecting:

j9pWAU1.jpg

I very much doubt this is an XP vs Vista case, my tests solidify my opinion that the predicament under which @Dave-H finds himself is probably caused by something at his end...

I would restart router to get a new IP, restart the OS (this seems to be a cure-all :D), restart browser, clear again browser cache and cookies; if all fails, then I would suggest starting with a new, clean, browser profile and testing there (obviously, at least one UA changing extension must be installed, or the .js files method applied). Often times, simply disabling content blockers and/or security extensions is not enough on its own...

Also, has attention been paid to my previous tip:

On 8/10/2019 at 9:40 PM, VistaLover said:

3. Clear any skype related folders in your browser's "<ProfileDir>\storage\default" directory, restart browser and re-try...

Cheers :)

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Well I just tried using a new default Firefox profile, but that doesn't seem to be as straightforward as I thought it would be!
I simply renamed the profile folder and created a new empty folder with the same name.
When I ran Firefox, it ran in an apparently default condition, but was completely unusable, just throwing up security certificate errors on every site I tried to visit!
Is there something that I need to copy over from the old profile (which still works fine when restored), I can't for the life of me see what it is.
:dubbio:

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Here's how I do a "clean" profile:

  1. Start Firefox. (First off, rename your original profile back) ;)
  2. Type "about:profiles" in the address bar
  3. Click "Create a New Profile"
  4. Give it a name; e.g., "Clean Profile" and let the browser build it
  5. Under the newly created profile, click "Set as Default Profile" (do not click "Launch Profile in New Browser;" it won't be entirely "clean")
  6. At the top, click "Restart Normally"
  7. Do your testing
  8. To switch back, do steps 2, and 5 and 6 again with your usual default profile

You can keep the "Clean Profile" for later tests of this sort.

If it works with a clean profile, you can create yet another profile, then start adding back your add-ons, etc. until you find out what's causing the problem with Skype.com.

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Thanks @Mathwiz!
I have to say I wasn't aware of the about:profiles option.
I have run "firefox -p" in the past, which seems to do pretty much the same thing.
Anyway, I have created a clean profile "properly" this time, but the problem I had before is still there.
I'm just getting this on every site I visit -

Image1.thumb.jpg.c9930d97ca0b6f0167ac72c21835d1e9.jpg

I can't even access the Mozilla add-ons download page.
I can add endless exceptions for every site I visit, and they then work, but I can't test anything properly in that scenario.
Any idea why this might be happening?
:dubbio:

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Thank you @Bersaglio!
That was the problem of course.
The default is to use system proxy settings, and of course I had forgotten that I had to change that to "no proxy" when I started using the ProxHTTPSProxy.
All fine now, and I installed the User Agent Switcher on the clean profile.
I set it to use "Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Fedora; Fedora; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/73.0.3683.86 Safari/537.36" on all sites, and Skype worked fine!
:thumbup
Now all I've got to do is find out what it is in my normal profile that's stopping it from working!
:dubbio:
I know it's not any of my extensions as it still doesn't work with them all disabled.
I did try changing the user agent to the one above for all sites, and that makes no difference.
:no:

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Another "about:" URL that might help is "about:support".

Try this on your regular profile, and scroll down to "Important Modified Preferences." (Might be easier to print them out.) Compare with your "clean" profile (should be very few there) and see if any look like they might be related.

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Thanks again, yes I have used about:support in the past to check on the status of service workers.
I'd never noticed that it recorded changes to important settings!
I can't see anything suspicious on my normal profile's settings configuration.
There are a large number of entries relating to printing, which I assume are irrelevant.
Perhaps you could have a look and see if anything jumps out at you.
The last change I made to Firefox was changing it to run multiple processes, but I can't think that this would have caused the problem with Skype Web.
I was suspicious of hardware acceleration, but switching it off makes no difference.
Cheers, Dave.
:)


Firefox Data Normal Profile.txt
 

Firefox Data Clean Profile.txt

Edited by Dave-H
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Hello, on my side I use the 360Chrome browser. I can connect to skype and see and respond to messages with windows xp 32, but I would like to know if there is an alternative or a way to make calls, although I think it's not not possible, thank you in advance for your answer.

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AFAIK there's no way to use Skype on Windows XP now other than the web version, which cannot make calls.
Once Skype Desktop version 7 was blocked, that was the end of it I'm afraid.

I'm now finding that I'm getting the "something went wrong" message even with my clean profile on Firefox 52.9 ESR.
It did work the first time I tried it, but now won't, even if I clear all the cookies and the cache.
I'm using the "Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Fedora; Fedora; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/73.0.3683.86 Safari/537.36" user agent string for all sites on the clean profile, with no add-ons apart from the user agent switcher.
I can sometimes actually see my Skype screen, with all the conversations listed, but then it throws me out again almost immediately.
Anyone any more ideas?
Thanks, Dave.
:)

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Run Windows PAE patch for enough memory - run Virtual virtual with OS which is supporting Skype within or Unity window mode (Vmware only) its behaves as normal Window.

Edited by ruthan
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7 hours ago, ruthan said:

Run Windows PAE patch for enough memory - run Virtual virtual with OS which is supporting Skype within or Unity window mode (Vmware only) its behaves as normal Window.

I know that it is not optimal, but it is soon to be our only way of using Skype.

After a quick test, it seems to be working flawlessly and it doesn't take up that many resources either. (If you have enough RAM, that is)

 

untitled.thumb.png.8d343cf1c098f0608c78a39a1ff1adda.png

 

Edited by Windows 2000
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Thanks @ruthanand @Windows 2000, but that's a bit of a sledgehammer to crack a nut in my case!
I have other ways of using Skype, on my phone and on Windows 10, so not being able to access Skype for Web on Windows XP isn't the end of the world.
It's just puzzling as to why it no longer works.
Can anyone else definitely confirm that web.skype.com is working OK for them with Firefox 52.9 ESR?
If it is working for other people, then it obviously should be working for me.
If Skype have changed their code to actively throw out logins on Firefox regardless of the user agent string then there's probably nothing that can be done, but it would be good to know for sure.
Thanks, Dave.
:)

Edited by Dave-H
Typo
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Just to add, thanks to pointers from @BersaglioI can now run Skype for Web on my installation of Google Chrome 49 if I really need to.
I'd still like to know that the problem is with Firefox though!
:dubbio:

Edited by Dave-H
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