223105 - there needs to be a command line option to disable the "remote" functionality

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(Core Graveyard :: X-remote, enhancement)

Description

[jeff putnam]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.5) Gecko/20031007 Firebird/0.7
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.5) Gecko/20031007 Firebird/0.7

I just found a problem with printing (submitted to bugzilla), but my firebird
has the tab extensions enabled and people seem to get cranky when you report
options when any extensions are turned on.  

So I keep another vanilla copy of firebird - on another machine - so I can check
these things. (I also use multiple profiles, but sometimes forget and install
the tab extensions in the distribution directory so all the profiles get it.)  

But today when I went to try that, using X remotely, the remote firebird
connected to the local firebird and used the local window.  This is a nice
feature.  But it should be easy to turn it off and I cannot find a command line
flag to do so.

Thus, this is a request for such a flag.  


Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. open firebird
2. try your best to open a separate firebird 
3. fail 

Actual Results:  
only one running browser

Expected Results:  
two running browsers

Comment 1

[Christian :Biesinger (don't email me, ping me on IRC)]

-> firefox, mozilla does not use -remote by default

Comment 2

[Jo Hermans]

*** Bug 254757 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 3

[Jo Hermans]

*** Bug 254994 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 4

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

*** Bug 254994 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 5

[Robin Monks]

Is this still here in newer versions of Mozilla Firefox?

Comment 6

[Robin Monks]

Moving to Core->X-Remote...

Comment 7

[John Garvin]

confirmed. Behavior exists in Firefox
-Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; rv:1.7.3) Gecko/20041001 Firefox/0.10.1 (on
machine "local")
-Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.7.7) Gecko/20050414 Firefox/1.0.3
(machine "remote")

transcript:
local $ xhost + remote
local $ ssh remote
...
remote $ export DISPLAY="local:0"
remote $ firefox & 

---------
In another xterm on local, typing firefox opens another window, or tab in the
existing firefox window. Running ps on the local machine confirms firefox is not
running.

Comment 8

[:Mook]

Does setting MOZ_NO_REMOTE work for you?  I.e., 

local $ xhost + remote
local $ ssh remote
...
remote $ export DISPLAY="local:0"
remote $ export MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1
remote $ firefox & 

Comment 9

[Steve Kelem]

(In reply to comment #8)
> Does setting MOZ_NO_REMOTE work for you?  I.e., 

% setenv MOZ_NO_REMOTE 1

worked for me (in tcsh).

I'm still puzzled as to why this option exists.  If I wanted to run the program locally, I would have run it locally.

Comment 10

[Greg Trounson]

export MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1
in bash does not work for me.  The variable sets okay:
set |grep MOZ
MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1
but launching firefox still results in the local copy, with nothing running on the remote machine.

This happens on the following distros:
Debian Stable
Fedora Core 3 and 5

Curiously it works as expected on Debian Unstable.

Comment 11

[Greg Trounson]

(In reply to comment #0)
> But today when I went to try that, using X remotely, the remote firebird
> connected to the local firebird and used the local window.  This is a nice
> feature.  But it should be easy to turn it off and I cannot find a command line
> flag to do so.

I can't think of a single case in which this feature could possibly be useful.  If you're logged into a remote machine it's presumably with a purpose to do something ON THAT MACHINE.  

If one has a desire to launch a web page on the local machine surely one would do it by means of opening a new window/tab in the local browser or a local terminal.  What is the history behind this feature?  I find it hard to believe that someone actually requested it.

So I would propose removing this feature entirely, or perhaps have a command-line switch for people that can't live without it.

Comment 12

[charlie]

This bug still exists in Firefox3 using Xubuntu 8.10

Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux x86_64; en-US; rv:1.9.0.4) Gecko/2008111319 Ubuntu/8.10 (intrepid) Firefox/3.0.4

Comment 13

[Christopher Blizzard (:blizzard)]

Actually, there is a --no-remote command line flag.  I use it pretty often.