2051148 - Type-ahead is broken in the search option dropdown lists

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: Address Bar, defect, P3)

Description

[TechHorse]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:152.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/152.0

Steps to reproduce:

Using Firefox 152.0.2 64-bit and Windows 10.

In both the address bar and dedicated search bar I used to be able to do the following.

1. Type a search term.
2. Press alt+down to open the list of search engines / options.
3. Press a single key to quickly select an option that begins with that character. G for Google, D for DuckDuckGo, etc.

But something has broken and that last step no longer works. A keyboard user now has to manually arrow through a (potentially large) list to get to the desired option.

I have tested in both troubleshoot mode and a different profile, with the same results.

Please fix this regression, thanks.

Comment 1

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

The Bugbug bot thinks this bug should belong to the 'Firefox::Search' component, and is moving the bug to that component. Please correct in case you think the bot is wrong.

Comment 2

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

The severity field is not set for this bug.
:standard8, could you have a look please?

For more information, please visit BugBot documentation.

Comment 3

[James Teow [:jteow]]

Hi TechHorse, would you be able to use mozregression to find a regression range for this? That'd be extremely helpful to pin down what caused it.

Comment 4

[TechHorse]

Hello James. To be honest I am not overly confident when it comes to installing new unfamiliar software. As a visually impaired user I won't know how it will work with my screen reader and / or without a mouse, or what might go wrong with the install etc.

However, I am reasonably certain that the regression is likely to have occurred in one of the FF150.x releases. Or if not, then one of the later 149.x releases.

I believe that 149 introduced the unified search button to the dedicated search bar, and initially its menu worked the same as the address bar's had since it first got that button a while ago.

That is, the menus responded to pressed characters and options could be quickly selected by typing the first letter of the desired item.

But I think that this had broken by 150.0.3, although unfortunately I can't remember whether it was in this or an earlier version.

I have found a workaround of sorts. I have gone into the settings and removed all but three or four of the engines. Not ideal but at least the most frequently used options now require only one to three arrow presses to get to. And so it still feels as if I can switch between these engines quickly.

(But obviously the original 'jump to an option by pressing a letter key' method was much more preferable, especially for those keyboard users who want to frequently access and switch between a larger number of engines.)

Comment 5

[James Teow [:jteow]]

Hi TechHorse,

Thanks for letting us know. I ran moz regression and I believe I found the regressing patch as I tested the patch prior to the bug and found I had the ability to use keyboard shortcuts to highlight the engine.

Comment 6

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

The bug has a release status flag that shows some version of Firefox is affected, thus it will be considered confirmed.

Comment 7

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

Set release status flags based on info from the regressing bug 1998985

Comment 8

[Moritz Beier [:mbeier]]

Sorry, this was caused by my patch. I will post a patch in a second.

Comment 9

[Moritz Beier [:mbeier]]

Attachment: Bug 2051148 - Fix accesskeys in the search mode switcher. r?#urlbar-reviewers

Comment 10

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://github.com/mozilla-firefox/firefox/commit/a41dfff58435
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/f43c4e4bb21d
Fix accesskeys in the search mode switcher. r=urlbar-reviewers,fluent-reviewers,daleharvey,bolsson

Comment 11

[Atila Butkovits]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/f43c4e4bb21d

Comment 12

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

The patch landed in nightly and beta is affected.
:mbeier, is this bug important enough to require an uplift?

• If yes, please nominate the patch for beta approval.
  • See https://wiki.mozilla.org/Release_Management/Requesting_an_Uplift for documentation on how to request an uplift.
• If no, please set status-firefox153 to wontfix.

For more information, please visit BugBot documentation.

Comment 13

[Monica Chiorean]

I was able to reproduce the issue on Win11x64 using FF build 152.0.6.
Verified as fixed on Win11x64/Mac 15.5/Ubuntu 24.04 using FF build 154.0a1.

Comment 14

[Moritz Beier [:mbeier]]

Unfortunately we can't uplift this because the patch includes string changes.