1979288 - Enable Navigation API on Nightly

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Core :: DOM: Navigation, enhancement)

Description

[Sebastian Zartner [:sebo]]

Once all major features are implemented and bugs are fixed, the dom.navigation.webidl.enabled pref should be enabled by default for Nightly builds.

Given https://farre.github.io/progress/?bug=1777171 looks fairly green already and a good part of WPTs pass when dom.navigation.webidl.enabled is enabled, I think it is soon in a state in which people can play around with it. And especially in regard of this being part of Interop 2025, it makes sense to enable it early to be able to track its implementation state on the WPT dashboard.
Looking at the blocking bugs of bug 1777171, I'd say bug 1890755, bug 1895257, and bug 1949062 are the ones that should be fixed before the flag can be switched on for Nightlies. Though, Andreas, Jan, since you are the implementers, you probably know better what's missing here.

Sebastian

Comment 1

[Sebastian Zartner [:sebo]]

Release Note Request (optional, but appreciated)
[Why is this notable]: Modern way to initiate, intercept, and manage browser navigation actions, solving the shortcomings of the History API and window.location
[Affects Firefox for Android]: yes
[Suggested wording]: Starting with Firefox x, Nightly builds now support the Navigation API. This API provides the ability to initiate, intercept, and manage browser navigation actions. It is a successor to previous web platform features such as the History API and window.location, which solves their shortcomings.
[Links (documentation, blog post, etc)]:
https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Navigation_API

Comment 2

[Jan Jaeschke [:jjaschke]]

Thanks for opening this bug. Yes, when navigation API is feature complete, we'll enable it on Nightly. This might take a few more weeks though.

Comment 3

[Sebastian Zartner [:sebo]]

I just closed bug 949062, bug 1895257 already got implemented and bug 1890755 also seems to be mostly finished. Therefore, I think it's time to enable the Navigation API on Nightly. Jan, what do you think?

Sebastian

PS: Note that by enabling this feature, Firefox will probably have the highest total score in the Interop 2025 project for the first time this year.

Comment 4

[Jan Jaeschke [:jjaschke]]

Bug 1993238 tracks web pages which are currently broken when navigation API is enabled. We’re hoping to get those breakages fixed in the next cycle. We can’t enable it on nightly with breakages on larger sites like Reddit. Reporting any additional site breakages with the pref on will be highly appreciated.

(And we’re excited about the interop score with the feature enabled as well :) )

Comment 6

[Andreas Farre [:farre]]

Attachment: Bug 1979288 - Enable Navigation API on Nightly. r=avandolder!,jjaschke!,smaug!

Comment 7

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

Attachment: WIP: Bug 1979288 - Adjust Navigation API WPT job to disable the pref on Nightly r=#taskgraph-reviewers

Comment 8

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/commit/36a1a31a8455
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/86a3463c7d95
Enable Navigation API on Nightly. r=webidl,smaug,jjaschke,avandolder

Comment 9

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/commit/40b68f1baa72
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/9f65f2abb886
Revert "Bug 1979288 - Enable Navigation API on Nightly. r=webidl,smaug,jjaschke,avandolder" for causing mochitest failures @ test_interfaces.html

Comment 10

[amarc]

Backed out for causing mochitest failures

• Backout link
• Push with failures
• Failure Log

Comment 11

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/commit/0d4715e2385f
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/b8f1c6b3b8a0
Enable Navigation API on Nightly. r=webidl,smaug,jjaschke,avandolder

Comment 12

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/commit/d25bbdeb41c2
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/77f58830c8bd
Update wpt metadata @ common-to-both-axes-supercedes-first-in-tree-order.html r=avandolder,jjaschke DONTBUILD

Comment 13

[Cristian Tuns]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/b8f1c6b3b8a0
https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/77f58830c8bd

Comment 14

[Dianna Smith [:diannaS]]

Added to nightly 146 release notes where it will remain for three cycles, or until the flag is enabled for all channels.
https://www.firefox.com/en-US/firefox/146.0a1/releasenotes/

Comment 15

[Alex Finder]

(In reply to Pulsebot from comment #8)

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/commit/36a1a31a8455
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/86a3463c7d95
Enable Navigation API on Nightly. r=webidl,smaug,jjaschke,avandolder

Perfherder has detected a browsertime performance change from push 86a3463c7d95316b2905a2d45caa3a14d843a5a5.

No action is required from the author; this comment is for information purposes only.

If you have any questions or need any help with the investigation, please reach out to a performance sheriff. Alternatively, you can find help on Slack by joining #perf-help, and on Matrix you can find help by joining #perftest.

Regressions:

Ratio	Test	Platform	Options	Absolute values (old vs new)	Performance Profiles
4%	speedometer3 Perf-Dashboard/SelectingRange/Async	macosx1500-aarch64-shippable	fission webrender	0.50 -> 0.52	Before/After

Details of the alert can be found in the alert summary, including links to graphs and comparisons for each of the affected tests.

If you need the profiling jobs you can trigger them yourself from treeherder job view or ask a performance sheriff to do that for you.

You can run all of these tests on try with ./mach try perf --alert 47289

The following documentation link provides more information about this command.

Comment 16

[Chris Mills [:cmills]]

I've updated all of the Navigation API compat data in light of this, in https://github.com/mdn/browser-compat-data/pull/28434.

Can I ask — are there any features of the Navigation API that Firefox doesn't support yet? I checked through the Gecko WebIDL, and everything seems to be there, but I just wanted to check to see if there were any subtleties I'd missed.

Comment 17

[Chris Mills [:cmills]]

See https://github.com/mdn/content/issues/41872. All PRs are now merged.

Comment 18

[Ryan VanderMeulen [:RyanVM]]

Removing the Nightly release note in favor of the one from bug 1997962.