210932 - Add pref to enable inline autocomplete for web content

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Toolkit :: Form Manager, enhancement)

Description

[tyl2]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.4b) Gecko/20030611 Mozilla Firebird/0.6
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.4b) Gecko/20030611 Mozilla Firebird/0.6

Inline autocomplete should be implemented when Firebird fills data fields on
pages with forms.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Find a form.
2. Start typing in a field.

Actual Results:  
Suggestions are displayed in a sort-of drop-down list.

Expected Results:  
Inline autocomplete should occur as well.

http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=208774 is a related bug, but only
filed for the location bar.

Comment 1

[Jesse Ruderman]

Depending on how this is implemented, JavaScript might be able to see non-chosen
matches that are completed inline, which would be a slight privacy problem.  I
think it's possible to implement inline autocomplete for forms without
introducing that problem.

Comment 2

[Peter Beckman]

I have a problem with this, and this is the most relevant bug I can find.

Currently, autocomplete and formfill work against me.  I have a form on a web
page.  This form is the same form that is used in registration, only if I am the
administrator, I pre-fill that form with another users information; used for
editing information in the DB.  

Unfortunately, I have to use IE because Firebird/Mozilla pre-fills all of the
form with MY data that I used to sign up with; I said YES to save the form
values because I thought it would be useful on another site, but it turns out to
foil my attempts to use the form at all.

I'm happy to open a different bug on this if this bug is not what you are
discussing.

Comment 3

[David P James]

Taking QA. Sorry for the bugspam

Comment 4

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

As far as I can see, this has been implemented since the new toolkit
autocomplete code landed.

http://bonsai.mozilla.org/cvsblame.cgi?file=mozilla/toolkit/components/autocomplete/public/nsIAutoCompleteInput.idl#67

You can test it by setting the browser.urlbar.autoFill pref to true in
about:config (you may have to add it), or by using a <textbox
type="autocomplete" completedefaultindex="true"> (XUL).

Am I missing something?

Comment 5

[Robert Parenton]

(In reply to comment #4)
> As far as I can see, this has been implemented since the new toolkit
> autocomplete code landed.
> 
> Am I missing something?

Yes, this bug is about inline autocomplete in HTML form fields, which has not
been implemented.  This bug has nothing to do with the Location Bar.

Comment 6

[tyl2]

I concur with comment #5 and just want to add that comment #2 is irrelevant, as
the user can now go into Options and delete the form data.

Comment 7

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

(In reply to comment #5)
> Yes, this bug is about inline autocomplete in HTML form fields, which has not
> been implemented.  This bug has nothing to do with the Location Bar.

It has been implemented, all that is needed is a pref to enable it by default.

Comment 8

[tyl2]

Gavin, I'm very happy that there's at least the option (though not in Options, haha) to autofill in the urlbar now, but this bug has nothing to do with that.

Comment 9

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

(In reply to comment #8)
> Gavin, I'm very happy that there's at least the option (though not in Options,
> haha) to autofill in the urlbar now, but this bug has nothing to do with that.

I didn't say it did... I said that it is implemented for form controls in web content, but no pref exists to enable it.

Comment 10

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

Attachment: patch to add a pref

This adds a browser.formfill.inline pref that can be used to turn on inline autocomplete for web content.

Comment 11

[Jesse Ruderman]

In bug 270697, form autocomplete was changed so pressing down does not fill the textbox immediately.  Inline autocomplete could be even more of a privacy problem than the pre-270697 behavior.

Comment 12

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

With the "inline" pref added by this patch set to true, the testcase in attachment 166384 [details] is indeed able to capture the "autocompleted" value that appears as you type. Given that, and the likelihood of there being bugs in this code (which as far as I can tell has never been used), turning this on by default is very clearly not an option, and providing a pref for it doesn't sound like a good idea to me either. What is the benefit of inline autocomplete, anyways? Maybe the current implementation is just buggy, but it doesn't seem useful to me at all.

Comment 13

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

I think this should be WONTFIX, for the reasons listed in comment 12.

Comment 14

[Justin Dolske [:Dolske]]

I also think WONTFIX, for the reason listed in comment 13. :)