1933112 - Do not restore saved tab groups in private windows

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: Session Restore, task, P1)

Description

[Stephen Thompson [:sthompson]]

If the user has a saved tab group in a normal window and goes to a new private window, I guess I could see the use case for retrieving the saved tab group from there. But I don't think it would work well because then the saved tab group would no longer be in the global session list of saved tab groups accessible from the normal window. If you close the private window, the tab group should not be automatically saved. Explicitly saving a tab group has the potential to store information beyond the lifetime of the private window.

The result of all of this suggests to me that we should

1. not show saved tab groups in private windows in any context
2. not show menu options that allow saving tab groups when in a private window
3. suppress any other mechanisms (like auto-saving tab groups in a window on window close) that would result in a tab group being saved from a private window

Comment 1

[Dão Gottwald [:dao]]

Adding another point here as we'll probably want to add a test for this too.

Comment 2

[Dão Gottwald [:dao]]

https://phabricator.services.mozilla.com/D230409#7970819 suggests we can close this now, but we probably still need to add tests?

Comment 3

[Dão Gottwald [:dao]]

(In reply to Stephen Thompson [:sthompson] from comment #0)

Explicitly saving a tab group has the potential to store information beyond the lifetime of the private window.

This is true for adding a bookmark from a private window as well, although that's only URLs and titles, whereas we store more information with groups.

The result of all of this suggests to me that we should

1. not show saved tab groups in private windows in any context

Agreed, given that after being open in a private window, they wouldn't get auto-saved when closing that window.

2. not show menu options that allow saving tab groups when in a private window

This is a tough one. Given how we handle bookmarking in private windows, I tend to think it would in principle make sense to allow users to save and close groups from private windows. However, it might be confusing to then be unable to find a group right after saving it due saved groups not being offered in private windows (point 1 above). This problem doesn't exist for bookmarks, since we can surface those in private windows without the risk of losing them when closing the window.

3. suppress any other mechanisms (like auto-saving tab groups in a window on window close) that would result in a tab group being saved from a private window

Agreed.

Comment 4

[Amy Lee [:amylee] UX]

2. not show menu options that allow saving tab groups when in a private window(In reply to Dão Gottwald [:dao] from comment #3)

(In reply to Stephen Thompson [:sthompson] from comment #0)

Explicitly saving a tab group has the potential to store information beyond the lifetime of the private window.

This is true for adding a bookmark from a private window as well, although that's only URLs and titles, whereas we store more information with groups.

The result of all of this suggests to me that we should

1. not show saved tab groups in private windows in any context

Agreed, given that after being open in a private window, they wouldn't get auto-saved when closing that window.

2. not show menu options that allow saving tab groups when in a private window

This is a tough one. Given how we handle bookmarking in private windows, I tend to think it would in principle make sense to allow users to save and close groups from private windows. However, it might be confusing to then be unable to find a group right after saving it due saved groups not being offered in private windows (point 1 above). This problem doesn't exist for bookmarks, since we can surface those in private windows without the risk of losing them when closing the window.

3. suppress any other mechanisms (like auto-saving tab groups in a window on window close) that would result in a tab group being saved from a private window

Agreed.

"2. not show menu options that allow saving tab groups when in a private window"

I agree and this was the in the original spec for private windows
https://www.figma.com/design/f6J2lH6XDxLxyzOLr2E8oE/Tab-Grouping-Spec?node-id=9545-332596&t=fypdPh01LsaYUPYY-1

In private windows, there would not be a "tab groups" section in the TOM menu (this is because all items there represent saved tab groups). We will display the tab group in the opened tabs section below it. If a user opens a new private window (private window 2) and opens a new tab, they can still right-click to move the tab to a group in private window 1 IF the tab group is currently opened in private window 1.

Comment 5

[Stefan Smagula]

Amy writes: "In private windows, there would not be a "tab groups" section in the TOM menu (this is because all items there represent saved tab groups). However, there are two classes of group in the TOM that are not "Saved and closed" groups:

• Groups present in this window (I believe this is still valid in private mode)
• Groups present in other private windows (I believe this is still valid in private mode)

Here's my understanding: In Private mode the goal is to segregate groups created in regular mode from groups created in any private mode window. When the user closes the private window or restarts, the groups in that private window disappear and do not reappear upon restart.

Comment 7

[Jeremy Swinarton]

Attachment: Bug 1933112: Tab groups only appear in TOM menus for windows with same privateness r?dao,dwalker

Comment 8

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/ea47e677f0c4
Tab groups only appear in TOM menus for windows with same privateness r=dao,tabbrowser-reviewers

Comment 9

[Sandor Molnar[:smolnar]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/ea47e677f0c4

Comment 11

[Gabi Cheta [:Gabi] Desktop QA]

Hello, Tab Groups saved and closed in normal browsing windows are shown in TOM menu in Private Windows with non-working context menu options (besides Delete Group option) in 137.0a1 (2025-02-18).
Is there another fix coming for this issue or should I log a separate bug?

Comment 12

[Amy Lee [:amylee] UX]

This is indeed an issue. Tab groups from a non-private window should never show up in the TOM menu in a private window.

Comment 13

[Jeremy Swinarton]

Hi :Gabi and :amylee, I've created a ticket to track this: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1949544