1408653 - Firefox address bar does not trigger virtual keyboard with touch screen on Linux

Status: NEW

(Core :: Widget: Gtk, defect, P3)

Description

[Parrenin]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:56.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/56.0
Build ID: 20170926190823

Steps to reproduce:

I have a touchscreen debian 9 linux laptop with firefox 56.
When I touch the address bar:


Actual results:

The cursor is placed in the address bar.
But the virtual keyboard does not appear.


Expected results:

The virtual keyboard should appear.
It is actually what happens in the epiphany web browser.

Comment 1

[Jim Mathies [:jimm]]

kats, have you ever dealt with touch on linux via your apz work? I'm wondering what our expectation are here.

Comment 2

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

I haven't dealt with things like the virtual keyboard. We probably haven't implemented support for triggering the virtual keyboard when a text field gets focus. I imagine that would live in the linux widget code so forwarding needinfo to Karl who might know more about this.

Comment 3

[Botond Ballo [:botond]]

If you're using a touchscreen laptop, does that not have a physical keyboard? Do you just prefer using the virtual keyboard instead?

I also downloaded the Epiphany web browser on a touchscreen Linux laptop, but I didn't get a virtual keyboard when tapping on the address bar there, either. Do you have to do something to enable it? (Or perhaps the issue is that my desktop environment is KDE, and this particular feature of the Epiphany browser only works in GNOME?)

Comment 4

[Karl Tomlinson (:karlt)]

I think I recall a similar report where the accessibility APIs triggered the virtual keyboard.
Jan, does this sound familiar?

If not accessibility, then I guess this would be triggered through the input method editors.

Gecko's address bar should behave similarly to the Entry demos in gtk3-demo.  I don't know how the address bar drop down would interact with the virtual keyboard, but I guess this problem has already been solved for IMEs.

Comment 5

[Jan Horak [:jhorak]]

Karl: yes, it could be bug 789038. 

Parrenin: Reporter, please check the at-spi2-core version: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=789038#c19. Which desktop environment do you use? Which on screen keyboard do you use (caribou?) ?

Comment 6

[Parrenin]

I use the standard gnome environment on debian 9, with its on-screen keyboard (OSK).
I could use my physical keyboard in this case, but I am doing some tests since I intend to buy a tablet and install debian on it.
I think it is indeed the same as bug 789038.
Sorry, I don't see how to check the at-spi2-core version. Not obvious for me.

Comment 7

[Jan Horak [:jhorak]]

Debian 9 "Stretch" seems to have at-spi2-core 2.22 [1], which seems to be too old (2.25.3 is the fixed version). Maybe Mike could help there.
[1] https://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=at-spi2-core

Comment 8

[Mike Hommey [:glandium]]

Help do what?

Comment 9

[Jan Horak [:jhorak]]

No chance getting newer at-spi2-core to the Debian or backport the fix? I don't know how or whenever Debian handles such situation.

Comment 10

[Mike Hommey [:glandium]]

Very unlikely.