906370 - Facebook and flashplayer always active

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Core Graveyard :: Plug-ins, defect)

Description

[candaules]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.0; rv:23.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/23.0 (Beta/Release)
Build ID: 20130814063812

Steps to reproduce:

Since november 2012, if you load a facebook page (without video!!!) 
the flashplayer plugin starts.
My FF session has always a FB page.



Actual results:

the flash plugin (and plugincontainer) remains always active, due to the facebook page (whatever page, no matter).
when I close FF I go a Vista warning: Firefox stop working, xul.exe crashed.
No crash log in FF, about:crashes is empty.
therefore a silent crash.
Minidumps in the minudump folder.
Reprodubible evey day, but only after a lot hours usage.


Expected results:

I should have happened exactly what happened during the 6 weeks with FF22!!!!
Just after installing FF22, I noticed that even I if have FB pages, I didnt see the flash plugin active in task manager. wow!
therefore...even a lot of usage (youtube too), closing FF in the task manager I saw flashplugin re-appearing for 0.5 seconds. then it closes, without issue: no xul crash, no warning, and....the minidumps folder ALWAYS empty!!!
this happened during the 6 week with FF22.

now I have FF23: the same issue as since a lot of months.

minidumps and xul crash (silent crash, without report) when closing FF, fully reproducible.

My request:
FF should handle flashplugin as in FF22!! 
even with FB tab opened, if I do NOT use youtube, I should NOT see the flashplugin.exe in task manager, and after closing youtube, the flashplugin should to *disappear* from task manager, even if I have FB tabs, exacly as happened in the wonderful weeks with FF22.
please.

Comment 1

[candaules]

FF22 (flashplugin + plugincontainer was active ONLY if needed, not ALWAYS):
I strongly used YT, without issues.

Now FF23 is as the previous FF (until 22):
flashplugin always present in task manag., and after YT usage I have the probem described above.

FF22 was perfect in handling the flashplugin, during 6 weeks.
I hope that you help me to obtain the same behaviour in ff23+ too.
thanks.
also flashplugin in task manager ONLY if I am using youtube, and after closing YT, (after a while, if I used YT for long time) the flash process should to disappear from task!! this way all is fine, at FF closing after a lot usage.
Fully reproducible the issue.
and fully reproducible the correct behaviour at ff closing, if I re-install ff22!!!!!!!!!!!

Comment 2

[Loic]

Type about:crashes and provide some crash reports (bp-...).

Could you test with a clean profile, please.
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-and-remove-firefox-profiles

Comment 3

[candaules]

no reports. 
about:crashes empty.

the same with new profile.

the problem:
if you open YT videos the flash plugin starts. ok.
closing YT, the process (+container) disappear. ok!

facebook requires flashplugin (no idea, why! this causes the problem)
My "homepage" is facebook.
even if you close FB, the flash plugin remains in task manager (the bad).
so...you can use youtube the whole day, no problem, but if you opened a FB page (even your personal settings in FB requires flash!?!)
you will have xul. silent crash and minidumps when closing firefox.

if you close youtube, you dont see flash.exe
but if you have (or if you close) Facebook, thee flash plugin remain always active, this causes the issues closing Firefox.

NO issue during the 6 weeks with FF22 (and...in FF22 Facebook did NOT activate flash the whole day!).

Please investigate the behaviour "facebook (without videos) and flashplugin" in firefox.
After a lot hours usage (using youtube in addition) I have these problem only during closing process.

If flash is not activated by facebook (as in FF22!!), after using youtube (closing youtube flash process is not more present in task), in task manager you will se flashplugin re-appear for 0.5 seconds. this is good: zero problems at closing.

If flash is activated by Facebook (why???) the flash plugin remain active (even closing facebook -and youtube), closing ff you will see:
the flash process disappear (minidumps) + vista say Firefox stop workinf, xul.exe crashed, click OK, at this point firefox.exe closes.
no reports, therefore I spoke about silent crash.

If Mozilla is unable to make a regression as in FF22 (better handling the flashplugin process when closing ff), I would like to see that facebook dont let the flash to start, as in ff22.
thanks for further investigations.

Comment 4

[candaules]

I wait the closing this evening or tomorrow, but the only thing I can make, is to attach here the minidumps files when closing ff, no other reports available.

it is very strange that facebook let the flashplugin to starts, but it even more strange that closing Facebook, the flash process remains and never disappear...causing the issue when closing FF.

Comment 5

[candaules]

Please add Jeromie Clark to the mailing list, as a representant of Adobe.
Facebook>Flash>Firefox

Comment 6

[Loic]

What's the version of Flash installed on your computer?

Comment 7

[candaules]

11.8.800.94
but the issue happened with the previous version too.
since one year I am writing in the adobe forum, unsuccessfully.
perhaps its due to how Firefox handle the plugin.

but what I am wondering is not only why facebook requires flash (even if you open your personal settings page!) but why the plugin is continuing to remain active.
The "solution" is: dont open facebook.

Perhaps the problem will be resolved when establishing why in ff22 I did not notice this behaviour.

No idea if facebook did some changes exactly in the minute where I update to ff22 and now there is a regression. 

The issue seems to resolve disabling the flash sandbox, but now it should be established why in ff22 all was fine even with sandbox turned on.

Comment 8

[Loic]

I tried both YT and FB websites, after closing the tab, the Flash process disappears after a few minutes.

The protected mode introduced in Flash 11.3 has implied various issues like focus stealing. Indeed, disabling it is a common workaround.

Anyway if it worked in the past with the protected mode turned on, could you install and use the tool mozregression to find a possible regression range: http://harthur.github.com/mozregression/

FF22 builds started in Feb 2013: mozregression --good=2013-02-01

Then post the output of the console.

Comment 9

[candaules]

yes, but the focus issue has been resolved by mozilla, not by adobe.

I installed ff22 on the 25th june.

hmmm I dont know if I could install this tool.
Never used.
Do you think that uploading the dump files (just happened the issue closing ff now!) may not help?

Comment 10

[Loic]

(In reply to candaules from comment #9)
> yes, but the focus issue has been resolved by mozilla, not by adobe.

No all the bugs, see bug 768802.

> I installed ff22 on the 25th june.
> 
> hmmm I dont know if I could install this tool.
> Never used.
> Do you think that uploading the dump files (just happened the issue closing
> ff now!) may not help?

It's pretty simple to use, it downloads for you a Nightly with a fresh profile, they you just need to enter good/bad following the result of your test.
In your casd, open a tab with Facebook and open the Task Manager. Close the tab and check if the process of Flash is still present after 2 or 3 min.

Comment 11

[Georg Fritzsche [:gfritzsche]]

Flash is found on Facebook for multiple things, not only when there are visible Flash-uses like video.
Also, we keep the plugin processes around for some time so they can be re-used when you visit multiple sites that use it in succession.
I'll have to check how long the processes are supposed to stay around, but that is probably no bug.

Another issue mentioned here is multiple Flash process being spawned - we've had reports of this before, but don't know how to reproduce. Can you provide steps to reproduce here?
This might be what leads to the crashes when closing Firefox.

Comment 12

[candaules]

Hi,
steps to reproduce.

Vista32.
FF (except FF22).
open facebook without video.
set FF Restore session.
the next day open FF, with facebook.
you see the flash plugin.

facebook should to remain opened the whole day!
in the meantime watch youtube videos.

after 16- or more hours close FF.
task manager:
the flash process closes.

firefox.exe still remains.

Vista does open a window: "Firefox stop working, xul.exe crash".
Minudump appear in the folder minidumps.

clic OK on Vista warning.

firefox.exe closes.

no crash report.
reopen FF: to trace of crash, session restored succesfully.

updating to FF22 this issue has been resolved.

friday 9th august:
after the holydays, autoupdate to ff23.

open task:
you see flashplayer active with a FB tab!
you are sure that a the evening the issue re-appear.
done. the issue re-appeared.

this since 2012 (except the 6 week with ff22).

but.....but....
the hing becomes ver more compex:

see the next message, in the meantime I close FF after a day usage.

Comment 13

[candaules]

I tried today:

today if I open facebook, the flash plugin doesnt load!! !!!!!

opening YT video, as you said, after closing it, the flashplugin disappears after 2-3 minutes.
even the yt tab "my subscriptions", with the titles and the video thumbnails requires flash, but closing it > flash disappears. ok.
or if I leave it opened the whole day, no problems (while in the past, leaving facebook opened --facebook requiring flash!!-- this caused the issue when closing FF)


Also today the issue seems that has been resolved without actions from my side (one minidump but 0KB, while usually 12KB, no crash on FF exit), 
if facebook doesnt require flash (as it is happening today with the SAME pages --very strange--!!!), all is ok, and today is ok.
but how long it will remains ok?

testing:
only when facebook requires flash, otherwise I guess that the issue doesnt happen, even after strong usage of youtube!!
FF should remain open the whole day, if you close it after a while, no issues.

after the "wonderful pause" with FF22 it seems that facebook required flash from 16th until 18th august, today it worked fine without flash! therefore today I am unable to reproduce the silent crash.

too much strange.

tomorrow I will test another thing, no matter if FB requires flash or not (maybe NOT a facebook issue):
open FF the morning and leave a youtube video active until the evening, then close FF with this YT tab!!
perhaps the issue re-appear, (I remember, this happened in the past, therefore I close YT before closing FF at evening).
I will test tomorrow.

Comment 14

[candaules]

I can upload a dump file, when the size is 12KB (not zero, as today!),
I can upload a dxdiag.txt

At the moment, on this "main pc" I cannot install other applications for testing purposes. thanks.

Comment 15

[candaules]

at the moment the one and only (unuseful) log:

(perhaps other people do experience this issue but with seven you dont become the Vista warning with xul.exe crash, and maybe that other people dont watch the folder minidumps).
please test with sanbox turned ON, and FF acceleration ON (compulsory for me, without acceleration I am unable to read the text in the browser due to blur...)


Nome evento problema:    APPCRASH

  Nome applicazione:    firefox.exe

  Versione applicazione:    20.0.0.4833

  Timestamp applicazione:    5152542c

  Nome modulo con errori:    xul.dll

  Versione modulo con errori:    20.0.0.4833

  Timestamp modulo con errori:    51525346

  Codice eccezione:    c0000005

  Offset eccezione:    000973d8

  Versione SO:    6.0.6002.2.2.0.768.3

  ID impostazioni locali:    1040

  Informazioni aggiuntive 1:    40d4

  Ulteriori informazioni 2:    4062ad41ec8067256aa4c5e2b56d3c79

  Ulteriori informazioni 3:    40d4

  Ulteriori informazioni 4:    4062ad41ec8067256aa4c5e2b56d3c79

Comment 16

[candaules]

I saved the log from FF20, but its the same with FF23 ;)

Comment 17

[Georg Fritzsche [:gfritzsche]]

Facebook requires Flash all the time for me (maybe for notification sounds or some ads ...). But where and when they use Flash isn't really interesting.

The interesting part is when FB uses Flash and things go wrong. For that we can use either crash-reports, dumps or specific steps to trigger this ("might crash after a day" doesn't help much i'm afraid).

Alternatively finding a regression range as suggested in comment 8 could provide clues as to what changed the behavior here.

Comment 18

[candaules]

(new skin today for bugzilla ;)


miracle!!
even today FB did not require flash. this is a news.
even "subscriptions/activity" of youtube profile did not require flash TODAY!

after a very strong usage of FB and youtube (20 videos), a lot of hours, with 2 tabs FB and subscriptions/activity ALWAYS open, all went fine!! zero issue.

why all went fine?
because after closing all the YT tabs, the flash precess disappeared from task manager.
why it disappeared? because today FB and subscriptions/activity of YT do not use flash!!

firefox 23.

I guess that the issue arise ONLY when the flash process remain active the whole day.

Tomorrow I will test: 
leaving the whole day a YT video, and closing FF with YT video in the tab, perhaps this is a way to reproduce the issue, that I dont notice sicne 2 day hmmmm

Comment 19

[candaules]

obviously the "disappeared" flash process does re-appear for 0.5 seconds closing FF, but this is good.

Comment 20

[candaules]

A very long and accurate test today.

==> conclusions:
the problem is not the flash plugin remaing active when closing, but

the flash plugin remaing active when closing, when activated by facebook only! <==

today I closed FF with YT video running 16 hours, all went fine.
since 3 days FB does not require flash, therefore my issue is resolved (it will come back when FB will require flash again).
also FF has problems on exit with flash, but only with flash activated by facebook.

Comment 21

[Georg Fritzsche [:gfritzsche]]

My best guess is that something with Facebooks Flash usage (also possibly a specific ad, game, ...) triggered the issue which can result in those run-away Flash processes, which might be the same underlying issue that causes the crash on closing.

However, without more specific steps i don't see how we could investigate this. Please re-open if the issue occurs again and you can narrow it down or have any other further information.