1813880 - Some tabs just go blank after coming back to them

Status: NEW

(Fenix :: Browser Engine, defect)

Description

[Jeff Boek [:boek]]

From github: https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/27929.

Some tabs, especially youtube (but some other websites too, I'm not sure if it's about the website but it definitely happens everytime with youtube) would just go blank if I went to another tab or went off firefox for a minute or two. This is how they look like then:

Device name
Samsung Galaxy S20+

Android version

Android 12
Firefox release type
Beta

Firefox version

108.0b.3 (however this happens since very long, it's not specific to beta)

Device logs

No response

┆Issue is synchronized with this Jira Task

Change performed by the Move to Bugzilla add-on.

Comment 1

[Aftermath]

I'm the OP of the Github issue.
I totally forgot about it, it may be due to an update. I'll test it for one more week and let you know if anything has changed.

Comment 2

[Olivia Hall [:olivia]]

Thanks for filling this bug report!

Does it look like the issue has been resolved due to an update or is the issue still active?

Comment 3

[Aftermath]

Sorry for taking so long.
The thing is, the internet is not usable without uBO, and this is the only addon I'm using on Firefox on android. The problem still exists, but I can't reproduce it anytime I want.
I just had the problem again, but this time with Google Docs opened up in a tab. I went on it, it's grey and when typing anything on the URL Bar at the top (example in picture: Search anything) it stays the same. When typing any website (for example www.google.com) it doesn't change anything (so "Search anything" stays on the top bar).
https://imgur.com/ru78wWx

I will update with Logs the next time it happens, but I'm having a terrible exams time atm.

Comment 4

[Jeff Boek [:boek]]

Can we close this as a dup?

Comment 5

[Kaya [:kaya]]

By looking at the screen shot sent on Comment 3 and the ticket description, I presume that this is not a duplicate of 1840665.
My presumption is based on:
1- The lock icon on the search bar is "not" red-crossed on the ss. (in case the ss is taken after an https url tried to be loaded or a keyword search had been performed)
2-

it definitely happens everytime with youtube) would just go blank if I went to another tab or went off firefox for a minute or two

this part of the issue description does not apply to the case of 1840665. It should happen to all the websites/keyword searches. It should be persistent along the app sessions. App should've stayed in the buggy state unless there was an app update or application data ("not" cache) clearance was performed.

This looks like to be a temporary buggy state. One possible edge case may be the OS killing the child content processes because of their resource consumption but we somehow cannot spawn new content processes to basically reload that page, and it stays blank until we're able to create new content process for the tabs. But that's just one of many possible scenarios. Logs would be helpful to determine the gv's status and narrow down the scope of the scenarios.

Comment 6

[Aftermath]

It's definitely another problem, as this (app is not loading anything at all) & (It's happening even with new tabs, not just old tabs) or this (They can't interact with their bookmarks) don't apply.
For me, it's just Youtube (or newly Google Docs) having a grey tab (not always reproducible) when the app is minimized (and I don't have power-save mode on).
Silly me that I just found out I can get debug logs from the firefox profiler without the complicated computer thing, as I'm not a very technical guy. I'll get the profile once the bug is reproducible (happens once a week or every 2 weeks)

Comment 7

[Aftermath]

Good/Bad news! I just reproduced, took a video and used the built-in Firefox Profiler for the logs. As I said, this was only the case for this specific tab. All other 6 youtube tabs had no problems, it just happens randomly to a specific tab.
Here's the link for the logs: https://profiler.firefox.com/public/epbx1cfhxr8q1qdmwwsczys8q1mvesfpn2adkj8
Here are the videos (I cut the part where I open the settings as it reveals my account's email address): https://imgur.com/a/5KKBzXs

Comment 8

[Aftermath]

Update: After spending like 10 mins cutting the video, sending things to my laptop and so on I went back to Firefox to check the tab. Now it reloaded perfectly fine and shows the original video. Searching and entering anything now works again for this tab.
I didn't close Firefox in this time, just minimized it.

Comment 9

[Aftermath]

Update:
Same bug just happened on Firefox Nightly (newely installed).
One interessting thing that I didn't notice, was that the tab connects somehow to the next/before normal tab and behaves like it (while keeping different links). It goes blank again when I try to reload. I also made a video out of it for a better explanation.
Video: https://imgur.com/a/EABMRBT
Profile (I tried to reload, tried to visist google.com and then stopped the profiler): https://profiler.firefox.com/public/z5s93fkhy2et4xcra6tfs5zy1wakst79r8przar

Comment 10

[jensenhwa]

The symptoms of this issue is identical to https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1807420 . As you can see with all the linked issues, the problem has been persistent and quite widespread.

@Aftermath, is there any chance that the problem happens only when you first opened the tab as a "custom tab" (from clicking a link in another app)? For me, I can reproduce the problem reliably when I open a custom tab, then spend some time in another high-memory app like Google Maps, then come back to the custom tab. Then, even after doing "Open in Firefox", the blank screen persists, just as in the video from Comment #7 above, and it's connected to the previous tab just like in the video.

I cannot reproduce the problem when the tab is originally opened as a normal tab from within Firefox, or if I select "Open in Firefox" before navigating away from the app.

I've run into this issue several times when having to switch apps to lookup a password or OTP, and it has more than once led to a loss of data when I lose the contents of form fields on a page. I don't see why this is not an S1 issue.

Let me know if there is any more info I can provide, hopefully this bug will get some traction. Thank you to the developers for taking this seriously!

Comment 11

[jensenhwa]

To be the most specific, I should have linked to https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1812359. I have personally experienced the issue countless times with custom tabs but have not used PWAs too much.

Comment 12

[Aftermath]

(In reply to jensenhwa from comment #10)

The symptoms of this issue is identical to https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1807420 . As you can see with all the linked issues, the problem has been persistent and quite widespread.

@Aftermath, is there any chance that the problem happens only when you first opened the tab as a "custom tab" (from clicking a link in another app)? For me, I can reproduce the problem reliably when I open a custom tab, then spend some time in another high-memory app like Google Maps, then come back to the custom tab. Then, even after doing "Open in Firefox", the blank screen persists, just as in the video from Comment #7 above, and it's connected to the previous tab just like in the video.

I cannot reproduce the problem when the tab is originally opened as a normal tab from within Firefox, or if I select "Open in Firefox" before navigating away from the app.

I've run into this issue several times when having to switch apps to lookup a password or OTP, and it has more than once led to a loss of data when I lose the contents of form fields on a page. I don't see why this is not an S1 issue.

Let me know if there is any more info I can provide, hopefully this bug will get some traction. Thank you to the developers for taking this seriously!

I just realized that I only open Youtube using the Shortcut on my home page (Go to youtube.com --> three dot menu --> add to homepage/start page), which is basically just like PWA if I'm not wrong.
However, this happened ONCE with Google Docs. I either opened the link directly with a new tab from my internet history, or from Whatsapp (so it might be a custom tab).

Comment 13

[Chris Peterson [:cpeterson]]

Clearing Priority so we can reprioritize these bugs relative to our ux-fun-2024 bugs.