212604 - firebird fails to open when thunderbird is open (linux)

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 226071

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[John]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.4b) Gecko/20030622 Mozilla Firebird/0.6
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.4b) Gecko/20030622 Mozilla Firebird/0.6

If thunderbird is running, launching a new instance of "MozillaFirebird" (even
if an instance is already running) will redirect the request to thunderbird and
give the error:

"Error launching browser window: TypeError:
Components.classes['@mozilla.org/appshell/component/browser/instance;1'] has no
properties"

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Launch MozillaFirebird from the commandline
2. Launch thunderbird from the commandline
3. Launch MozillaFirebird from the commandline
Actual Results:  
Error opens in Mozilla Thunderbird

Expected Results:  
A new Firebird window should open

Comment 1

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

This isn't new, I know there's a bug on this somewhere, although I think it
might be with Thunderbird, which isn't being tracked in Bugzilla yet.

Also, given the beta nature of the software, please try the latest versions of
both apps before reporting a compatibility bug as bugs do get fixed.  Thanks!

Comment 2

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

Confirming based on dupe.  ccing scott to see if he know anything about this.

Comment 3

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

*** Bug 214426 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 4

[Scott MacGregor]

this is an issue with xremote on linux. the same xremote code is used by both
thunderbird and firebird. Which ever x-remote services gets registered first
wins. Blizzard said he had to rewrite parts of x-remote to fix this.

Comment 5

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

*** Bug 215191 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 6

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

*** Bug 216139 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 7

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

*** Bug 216706 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 8

[Jon Baumgartner]

This just started happening to me on OS X, so this is not a Linux-only bug. I'm
using Firebird from 20030827, and Thunderbird from 20030823. If I click a
hyperlink in a TB mail message, TB will give me that TypeError message
referenced above instead of switching to Firebird. In fact, since FB is
registered as my default browser, clicking a hyperlink in any program will bring
TB to the front with that error message.

Comment 9

[Erik]

*** Bug 220466 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 10

[Sean Lynch]

This works fine for me now with Thunderbird 0.3 and Firebird 0.7, though I'm
pretty sure Firebird had nothing to do with it.

Comment 11

[Neil Weisenfeld]

This specifically does *not* work for *me* under Firebird 0.7 and Thunderbird 0.3.

Any attempt to use mozilla-xremote-client, after Thunderbird is started, fails
in the manner described.  This affects Mozilla and Firebird.

So, for instance, gnome-url-show does not work if the default browser is
Firebird or Mozilla.  

I think that the cause is well known and understood and simply waiting a resolution.

Comment 12

[Brice Burgess]

Any further word on this bug? I'm currently using Firebird 0.7 & Thunderbird 0.3
under XFCE4 as a WM.. and am still experiencing this *annoying* issue.

Comment 13

[James]

I've got a workaround for this that works fine for me:
Run firebird from a one-liner shell script, firebird.sh, that contains:
rm -f ~/.phoenix/default/*/lock && firebird
# ( "firebird" is a link to the lastest MozillaFirbird executable on my box.)


It blows away the lock file that seems to cause the problem.
I've been using this for a few months now with no ill effects.
(The same tactic applies to ~/.thunderbird/default/*/lock)

Comment 14

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

Bryner, I'm guessing you're more likely than blake to be mucking about in
x-remote code. 

Comment 15

[Neil Weisenfeld]

Okay, so I finally broke down today and decided to look at the
mozilla-xremote-client code myself.  While a mozilla build was going on rather
slowly, I decided to do a little background research and came across this page:

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/thunderbird/linuxurls.html

So apparently this problem was solved around Nov 22nd.  The solution is to make
sure that you have a recent mozilla-xremote-client (e.g. from a Thunderbird 0.4
build -- I'm using from rc1).

Also note that you may need to hunt down scripts that call
mozilla-xremote-client on your behalf and make arrangements to point them
towards the correct version.

Sorry if everyone knows this -- I just hadn't seen anything posted to this bug
recently other than people being added to the CC list.

Comment 16

[Scott MacGregor]

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 226071 ***