216694 - Firebird (gtk2 build) loses keyboard focus when going back and forth between virtual desktops

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[Per Lewau]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.5b) Gecko/20030812 Mozilla Firebird/0.6.1+
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.5b) Gecko/20030812 Mozilla Firebird/0.6.1+

This bug is similar to #209856, but for me this only happens with Firebird gtk2
builds and never with gtk1 builds, be it Mozilla or Firebird.

FB sometimes loses focus sometimes to the effect that you cannot type anything,
either in forms or location field or search field. You might see a cursor but
nothing happens when you type. Fiddling about (opening bogus urls by pasting
whatever into the browser window, minimizing mozilla, opening closing tabs)
mostly works, but I cannot predictable restore focus. I cannot tell what will
and will not work. Minimizing-reopening seems to work best.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Open mozilla firebird gtk2 build (I use a nightly build from 2003-08-12)
2. Start typing in the location field
3. Switch to another virtual desktop and back again
4. Continue typing
Actual Results:  
Nothing happens. No text appears, even after explicitly clicking in the location
field, trying to put the cursor where it should be.

Expected Results:  
More text should appear where I left off.

I use Linux 2.4.20 and glibc-2.3.2 (slackware 9.0 + dropline gnome installed)
and ctwm 3.6, but can reproduce this in dropline gnome and metacity so I don't
think it's a window manager problem. I cannot reproduce this with for instance
gnumeric, which is another gtk2 app. I have XFree86 4.3.

While filling out this bug report FB lost focus when scrolling the page using
the scroll bar. Minimizing the window and opening it again set FB straight however.

Something is seriously weird.

Comment 1

[Paul Grayson]

This happens to me all the time with Firebird 0.7
(MozillaFirebird-0.7-i686-linux-gtk2+xft.tar.gz on Redhat 8.0) and the ion
window manager.  When entering text into a form, if I switch to a second FB
window and back, focus often (I can't figure out exactly what triggers it) stays
with the second window, and further keystrokes get sent there.  Even clicking on
bookmarks (in the first window) affects the second window instead of the first!
 I can only recover focus in my window by switching around until it happens to
start working again.

Something is definitely strange here, and it makes this browser almost unusable
for me.  I haven't seen this problem with any other applications and it was not
present in FB 0.6.1.  I did clear my .phoenix when upgrading but noticed the
problem immediately.

Comment 2

[Per Lewau]

(Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.6b) Gecko/20031114 Firebird/0.7+)
(Slackware 9.1 + Dropline Gnome, XFree86 4.3, CTWM 3.6 (slackware updated since
report was filed))

This problem has diminished with the Moz FB I'm running now (see above). If I
start typing, change workspace back and forth I can keep typing where I left off.

Input fields on a web page (such as any one on this bug page) works as expected.
Text cursor is still where I left off and new text follows the old.

Location bar (and search bar) works differently and it could be considered right
depending on the value of right. When I start typing, switch workspace, switch
back, all the text in the location bar is selected and typing replaces the
selected string with newly entered text. I had expected that I would continue
where I left off, but as I said if this is wrong depends on what the correct
behaviour is.

Comment 3

[Simon Paquet [:sipaq]]

Marking WFM per reporter's comment.

Comment 4

[Paul Grayson]

This problem still occurs for me with Firefox 0.8 and a completely fresh
profile, under the ion window manager.  I typed in a random url, opened a new
window, clicked on one of the default bookmarks, switched back to the other
window, and was unable to type into the location bar.  Keystrokes there were
redirected to the other window.  This is probably related to an assumption
mozilla makes and ion breaks...I can usually restore focus by quickly switching
to two other desktops and then back again, whatever that means.  This may be the
same as bug 230097.

(Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.6) Gecko/20040207 Firefox/0.8)

Comment 5

[Uriel]

I can reproduce it with FireFox 0.9.1; I agree it might be the same as bug
230097, but eitherway this needs to be looked into as it makes FireFox unuseable
with many window managers.

Comment 6

[jsado_sc5]

Should this bug be reopened? It was marked resolved at the begining of this year
but there are more recent comments saying it should be looked into. I know that
I have been having this issue for nearly a year.

I also run Linux with the ion window manager. Firefox/Mozilla/Thunderbird stop
responding to my actions when I switch to a different application (not every
time of course). Sometimes I can mousewheel but not use the up and down arrow
keys. Sometimes the ctrl-t doesn't work. And sometimes it gets really hosed up
and I can't type into any text area, or select anything from a forms widget. At
that point I need to restart.

The bug is more frequent when I have multiple windows up with multiple tabs.

Comment 7

[otaylor]

This one sounds very much like the window manager is getting confused.
I'd be suprised if Mozilla has code to redirect keystrokes between 
windows, so most likely, the window that you don't think is focused
actually *is* focused.

A likely cause of this is that WM_TAKE_FOCUS events get sent to multiple
windows in sucession with the same timestamp and 

 window manager: window A, take focus
 window manager: window B, take focus
 window B: OK, give me the focus
 window A: OK, give me the focus

So, window A ends up with the focus but the window manager thinks window B
has the focus.

[ Almost certainly not a window manager bug in any case ]

Comment 8

[jsado_sc5]

I don't think this is a window manager issue, but a Mozilla one.

I can have many terminal windows opened at one time, and I never have keypress
issues. The window that is currently being displayed is the one that text is
entered into. The same goes for all other applications.

With Firefox, however, it seems that the second window always gets the focus and
is stuck that way regardless of which window is actually being displayed.

The problem is easy to reproduce.

1. start Firefox.
2. Open an new window.
3. Go to the first window and try to type into the URL bar.
4. The second window's bar will be populated with text.

Clicking within the URL bar of the first does not affect anything, and the
cursor does not appear. Within ION I have two frames. If I move my mouse into
the other frame and then back Firefox still does not recognize that this current
window should be active for text input.