1877834 - Closing Firefox using the cross on macos doesn't bring back previous tabs

Status: NEW

(Firefox :: Session Restore, defect, P3)

Description

[Harshit Sohaney [:hsohaney]]

Attachment: Bug demonstration

I'm not sure if this bug belongs in this component, but it is related to app startup.

I have the open previous windows and tabs option checked in about:preferences, and expect my windows and tabs to stay once I close firefox. I tend to use the top left cross to close applications sometimes on macos (and am aware that this doesn't actually quit the application). However, once I close firefox with the cross, and reopen it, none of my tabs are restored. It works as expected if I Quit firefox and reopen.

This is reproducible on release and nightly, and I noticed the same behaviour on chrome. I'm not sure if this is intended, since I suspect many people close their windows using the cross and expect to get their tabs back. Attached a video for reference.

Comment 1

[Dão Gottwald [:dao]]

This is working as intended, but UX may want to take a look at this to see if we should reconsider this behavior or somehow make it more obvious to users when a session ends.

There are somewhat related issues on Windows and Linux in bug 1818971 and bug 1884928.

Comment 2

[DD [:nickname]]

So the main bug with 9 years in waiting is closed, to make it appear more recent? This is obviously never getting fixed. I'm not deploying FF on any new machines, and will phase out on existing in the near future.

Comment 3

[Harshit Sohaney [:hsohaney]]

Is there any update on the progress for this? I often lose my tabs because of this

Comment 4

[Sam Foster [:sfoster] (he/him)]

Your tabs are still there if you go to History > Recently closed windows. The bug here is that its not clear - especially on MacOS - when your session ends and you can expect tabs to get automatically restored - vs. you have just closed a window and the way to get them back is to re-open that window.