1420542 - OS loses Firefox as default browser. Does not register with OS that it _is_ a browser

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Firefox :: Settings UI, defect, P3)

Description

[Frank Griswold [:griswolf] [:fgriswold]]

Not sure this is a Mozilla issue, but it feels like it:
I'm running on OS X 10.9.5 On this version of the OS, to set the default browser, you visit the Safari browser and select from the list of browsers it offers. As of Firefox v57, Firefox is not available in that list (though a few non-browsers are shown. Chrome is also not shown). Checking with Firefox:setting:General:Startup I see that "Firefox is currently your default browser"; but this statement is only sometimes true. Sometimes when this is shown, the system defaults to Safari as the browser.

Alas, this is intermittent. It may be triggered by starting Safari ? But not always.

How to trigger it: From a terminal, chant "open (any url)"; or create a webloc file and double click it in the finder. Note that Safari starts and displays the page at the url.

I did not see this prior to v57. I now see it several times daily (I tend not to use bookmarks, but prefer to "open" a URL, or double click a webloc)

Clunky work-around: Start another non-Safari browser, and set it to insist that it be the default browser. Quit from it. Visit Firefox settings and tell it to set itself as the default. Does not (reliably?) work if you attempt this with Firefox alone.

Comment 1

[Jared Wein [:jaws] (please needinfo? me)]

I'd like to find out what our usage stats are for Mavericks (10.9.x) and if this affects other versions of OSX.

Also intriguing is that it affects other third-party browsers, which makes me less concerned about it since it might be out of our hands or Apple could have broken something with an update to Safari.

Frank, can you use mozregression to see if this broke on our end? (I'm not sure if browsers being run by mozregression will show up in this list though).

Comment 2

[Jared Wein [:jaws] (please needinfo? me)]

(In reply to Jared Wein [:jaws] (please needinfo? me) from comment #1)

Sorry, I forgot to include steps on how to run mozregression.

mozregression can be found at http://mozilla.github.io/mozregression/

That website includes instructions on how to use it. mozregression works by downloading archives of old builds and extracting them to your local computer then executing them.

I'm skeptical that mozregression will help you with this bug because Firefox may need to be installed to show up in the Safari list, whereas mozregression doesn't install and it simply extracts the archive.

If it doesn't work, you could download and install some older versions of Firefox such as 56, 42, 27. Firefox 27 was the first full-development release after Mavericks was released (skipping Firefox 26 which came out just a couple weeks after Mavericks release). Firefox 42 is the half-way point between Firefox 27 and Firefox 56. And testing with Firefox 56 to see if there was a regression between Firefox 57 and 56.

Links to full installers:
Firefox 27: https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/27.0/mac/en-US/
Firefox 42: https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/42.0/mac/en-US/Firefox%2042.0.dmg
Firefox 56: https://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/firefox/releases/56.0/mac/en-US/Firefox%2056.0.dmg

Comment 3

[Frank Griswold [:griswolf] [:fgriswold]]

Observation: Regardless of which version of Firefox (57.0, 57.0.1, 56, 55) I am seeing the same strange behavior. Have become convinced that this is an (ailing) OS artifact that just happens to impact Firefox from among the apps I regularly use. I had previously NOT seen this behavior w/ 56 or 55 and AM seeing it now.

Bottom line: I'm pretty sure I was wrong to think this was a FF issue. Closing as not a bug. (Sorry about the time used)

Comment 4

[Jared Wein [:jaws] (please needinfo? me)]

No worries, thanks for reporting. I'd rather somebody report a non-bug than not report a real bug :)

Comment 5

[Virginia Bruce]

This has been happening to me on my home laptop, and just now, happened after I installed the latest Firefox on my work desktop. Both are running the latest version of OSX 10.11.6

Specifically, I click a link in email, and Safari opens rather than Firefox. When I go to Preferences-->general, the Preferred Browser pull-down menu is blank, showing none of my installed browsers.

Once I restart the computer, it works until it doesn't. Annoying.

I thought it might be Apple, but the "coincidence" with it occurring for the first time on my desktop right after installing 57.0.3 makes me think it's Firefox.