1395869 - session history issues [crashing on start-up in 54 and in 55 not even saving sessions any more]

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Firefox :: Session Restore, defect)

Description

[Mark.Handley]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2; WOW64; rv:55.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/55.0
Build ID: 20170824053622

Steps to reproduce:

In Version 54 I found Firefox crashing when launched on a very, very frequent basis.
In the recent Version 55 it is no longer even saving sessions since 27th August. 
I had 9 windows with over 1100 tabs.  One window seems to have been lost unless I can get a proper recovery from a session possibly as far back as 13th August. 



Actual results:

Version 54 would hog ridiculous levels of CPU 60-70% at leak but constantly >50%) and I'd have to stop doing anything else on the laptop for it to stand a chance of not crashing! 
Since going to Version 55, I seem to have lost the contents of one window and it always opens with just the Google home page tab i.e. any extra tabs opened are lost.  The other 8 windows recover but if I open new tabs in them they are not saved either.


Expected results:

Firefox should recover the 9 windows with a total 1100 tabs between them. If there is a limit, it should warn the user and they will do some house-keeping finding what really can be ditched or archive off data such as putting URLs in a word file. I have so many windows/tabs because it keeps a thorough audit trail of key info I've found in some cases I'm investigating and I can readily look at the info.

Comment 1

[Mike de Boer [:mikedeboer]]

I can't reproduce the problem you're having here, Mark! Perhaps you can share the contents of the about:support page in Firefox install? Does this also happen when you disable your addons (i.e. safe mode)?

Comment 2

[Mark.Handley]

(In reply to Mike de Boer [:mikedeboer] from comment #1)
> I can't reproduce the problem you're having here, Mark! Perhaps you can
> share the contents of the about:support page in Firefox install? Does this
> also happen when you disable your addons (i.e. safe mode)?

Hi

I hope all the following info suffices but I'll try to find other info you want

OK - The about page is below

About Page has 55.0.3 (32 bit)
Mozilla Firefox EU
euballot - 1.1
Firefox is up to date

The Maintenance Service file dated 26th August which coincides with when problems occurred about session management/history

Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeAssignPrimaryTokenPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeAuditPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeBackupPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeCreateGlobalPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeCreatePagefilePrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeCreatePermanentPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeCreateSymbolicLinkPrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeCreateTokenPrivilege. (1300)
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeDebugPrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeEnableDelegationPrivilege. (1300)
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeImpersonatePrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeIncreaseBasePriorityPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeIncreaseQuotaPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeIncreaseWorkingSetPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeLoadDriverPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeLockMemoryPrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeMachineAccountPrivilege. (1300)
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeManageVolumePrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeProfileSingleProcessPrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeRelabelPrivilege. (1300)
Could not disable token privilege value: SeRemoteShutdownPrivilege. (1300)
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeRestorePrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeSecurityPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeShutdownPrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeSyncAgentPrivilege. (1300)
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeSystemEnvironmentPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeSystemProfilePrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeSystemtimePrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeTakeOwnershipPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeTcbPrivilege.
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeTimeZonePrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeTrustedCredManAccessPrivilege. (1300)
Disabled unneeded token privilege: SeUndockPrivilege.
Could not disable token privilege value: SeUnsolicitedInputPrivilege. (1313)
Executing service command software-update, ID: bb18c512-6e6f-4f58-b02c-f53decae054f
Checking for Maintenance Service registry. key: 'SOFTWARE\Mozilla\MaintenanceService\965b7fc26dad90d340d2fa0a4879039f'
updater.exe was compared successfully to the installation directory updater.exe.
The updater.exe application contains the Mozilla updater identity.
The file "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\updater.exe" is signed and the signature was verified.
Passed in path: 'C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\updater.exe'; Using this path for updating: 'C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Maintenance Service\update\updater.exe'.
updater.exe was compared successfully to the installation directory updater.exe.
The updater.exe application contains the Mozilla updater identity.
The file "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Maintenance Service\update\updater.exe" is signed and the signature was verified.
Starting update process as the service in session 0.
Starting service with cmdline: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Maintenance Service\update\updater.exe" C:\Users\Mark\AppData\Local\Mozilla\updates\E7CF176E110C211B\updates\0 "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox" 17152 "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"
Process was started... waiting on result.
Process finished with return code 0.
updater.exe was launched and run successfully!
Service command software-update complete.
service command MozillaMaintenance complete with result: Success.

Comment 3

[Mike de Boer [:mikedeboer]]

Mark, from the log file you've sent me in an email - much appreciated! - I find the console spew from the SessionManager addon very suspicious and I'd recommend disabling that addon and the 'Avast SafePrice' addon you have installed & enabled is adware, which may track your browsing behavior[1].

I think with those two addons out of the way you may be able to restore those 1100 or so tabs. There's no limit on the amount of tabs or windows, by the way, and session restore does not start loading all those tabs right away to save startup time and resources. If you see that your tabs start loading in full right away when they're restored in the background, it can be an indication that an addon is interfering.


[1] Read more about this at https://www.howtogeek.com/239950/dont-use-your-antivirus-browser-extensions-they-can-actually-make-you-less-safe/

Comment 4

[Mark.Handley]

Mike
I was very surprised by your expression of suspicion about Session Manager. It was admittedly marked as Legacy but is official Mozilla add-on I believe.

http://sessionmanager.mozdev.org/options.html#saving 

I did as instructed and have disabled Avast SafePrice and SessionManager followed by restarting my computer. It still defaulted to the last session it has mecorded rather than including any of the new tabs I'd opened today.  

Unfortunately,  it doesn't seem to have resolved it as you'd expected and I had hoped.

Comment 5

[Mark.Handley]

Mike
Some good news. I enabled SessionManager and restarted and selected the session with 1121 pages. I opened a few more Tabs and then shut down. Today on starting Firefox all the new tabs are available as well as the old ones so you seem to have cracked the problem. Well done and thankyou and obviously it isn't a problem with Firefox. 
I do encounter problems on a handful of websites when background scripts cause problems with refreshing the page meaning one is waiting quite some time before you can begin entering data.  But, one lives with that. I'm just relieved that the issue with SessionManager has been resolved.
I'll flag the issue to Avast. They, within the last week or two, did an upgrade which hasn't resolved the problem with their SafePrice Addon.  but was done for other reasons I assume.
Regards
Mark

Comment 6

[Mike de Boer [:mikedeboer]]

\o/ Good news, Mark. There's still work to do, though, because ideally our sessionstore behavior would not be affected by factors from outside the browser. I'll be spending quite a bit of time to make things more resilient.
That aside, I'm glad you're back on track.