1296034 - White screens / unusable content, when using unreliable network, with uBlock origin installed

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Firefox for Android Graveyard :: Toolbar, defect, P2)

Description

[Andrzej Hunt :ahunt]

Using release, with uBlock origin, when I'm on a bad network and/or switching networks (e.g. entering/exiting train tunnels, or when my phone is switching between 3G and a unreliable WiFi network at home), I've noticed some issues:

* "hang" commences during page load (anywhere from 10 to 70% on the progress bar)
* webview usually appears white, sometimes the bottom half is black (corresponding to the keyboard area)
* Java UI is still functional
* switching tabs also results in whiteness, even on previously fully loaded tabs
* Eventually loading completes, everything (including tab-switching) works again as normal.

It's hard to reproduce this: using an emulator with restricted network speed doesnt' reproduce, enabling various bad networks in the OSX network conditioner doesn't cause it either.

Comment 1

[Andrzej Hunt :ahunt]

Attachment: renderhang.png

Here's a screenshot with the keyboard area blacked out - most of the time the whole page is white, the keyboard issue is quite rare.

Comment 2

[Jostein Kjønigsen]

I'm experiencing similar problems, on Firefox Beta on my Nexus 5X, running Android 7.0 DP5.

I originally posted this on support.mozilla.org, and was directed to this bug-report.

The support-item contains more details about how Firefox behaves. This may or may not be of interest to whoever decides to investigate this issue:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1135078

I've obtained a logcat which shows lots of Firefox processes being killed by ActivityManager (note the log is filtered with "grep firefox"). The logcat output can be found here:

http://pastebin.com/T2Y0u9kB

Comment 3

[Jostein Kjønigsen]

I also have observed a keyboard issue, although not identical to Andrzej's:

When Firefox locks up, and you click around (like in the URL bar), you may get the keyboard up, but typing a new address or anything wont cause anything to load. However the keyboard may still hang around.

If that happens, I've often found that even exiting Firefox and going to the launcher (clicking the android home-button) does not hide they keyboard. I usually have to click around in the launcher itself for that to happen.

Something fishy is definitely going on here.

Comment 4

[Kartikaya Gupta (email:[e-mail])]

Is this a recent regression? Do you see it on other devices as well? I've been using uBlock Origin in Aurora on my Nexus 4 for a while and haven't noticed these issues, but I guess my network connectivity is usually pretty good.

Comment 5

[Andrzej Hunt :ahunt]

(In reply to Kartikaya Gupta (email:[e-mail]) from comment #4)
> Is this a recent regression? Do you see it on other devices as well? I've
> been using uBlock Origin in Aurora on my Nexus 4 for a while and haven't
> noticed these issues, but I guess my network connectivity is usually pretty
> good.

I've only noticed it this month (corresponding to firefox 48). I've only seen it on my N6P (running Android N, developer preview 5 / NPD90G) - but that's also the only device I regularly travel with.

I'll try to switch to an N4 for daily usage to compare (I've got one with 4.3, and one with 5.0).

(The only other Android N capable device I have access to is a Nexus 9, which I don't think has a sim card slot - so I doubt I'll be able to test that in the same kind of bad-network environment I'm getting this issue in.)

Comment 6

[Kartikaya Gupta (email:[e-mail])]

Any update?