22400 - `about:blank' shown in location bar for blank page

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(SeaMonkey :: UI Design, defect, P3)

Description

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

TO REPRODUCE:
    * In Mozilla Navigator prefs, set `Navigator starts with > Blank page' (if
      it's not set like that already).
    * Exit Mozilla.
    * Start Mozilla (and open a Navigator window, if necessary).

WHAT HAPPENS:
    A blank document is displayed as expected, but `about:blank' is shown in the
    location bar.

WHAT SHOULD HAPPEN:
    The location bar should be empty.

BUILD:
    1999122011 Win32

Comment 1

[Eli Goldberg]

Not sure who should get this, so giving the wheel a spin. Guessing Don or Radha.
Trying Don first...

Comment 2

[don]

M15 ...

Comment 3

[Jesse Ruderman]

Should mozilla go to a blank page if you press enter in an empty location bar?

Comment 4

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

No. It should probably do something like pop down the menu of most recently used 
URLs.

Comment 5

[Jesse Ruderman]

Well, I like the idea of having an empty location bar when there's no page 
(slightly easier to start typing a url in), but it seems strange that the user 
won't be told how to get back to that blank page (now, they know that 
about:blank works).  Not that users want to load blank pages all the time.

Comment 6

[don]

Move to M20 target milestone.

Comment 7

[Bozhan Boiadzhiev]

NS 4 look better whitout this thing
now it looks like IE

Comment 8

[Warren Harris]

*** Bug 49558 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 9

[Koike Kazuhiko]

This is also a Linux problem.

It's annoying to delete "about:blank" before pasting an URL.

Comment 10

[Jesse Ruderman]

See also bug 26848, giving focus to location bar should select the url.

Comment 11

[R.K.Aa.]

*** Bug 59046 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 12

[R.K.Aa.]

adding keyw. from 59046

Comment 13

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Okay, so shall I take this then?

Comment 14

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Attachment: [patch] Don't show about:blank in urlbar for blank pages

Comment 15

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Making this All/All. mpt, Mac users want this too, right?

Comment 16

[Brian Ryner (not reading)]

r=bryner

Comment 17

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

I don't think the patch is quite thorough enough, because (while I can't try it 
out myself) it doesn't appear to cater for the following two scenarios:
(1) if I type `about:blank' into the address field and press Enter, it shouldn't
    disappear;
(2) if I type `about:blank' into the address field and press Enter, then go Back,
    then go Forward, the `about:blank' should still be present.

Comment 18

[Peter "jag" Annema]

mpt: why exactly would you want to keep about:blank if you type it in the urlbar
and press enter? It makes more sense to me for it to go away (that's also what
NS4.75 does under unix (dunno about other platforms)).

Comment 19

[Blake Ross]

If the user explicitly types it in, it should stay there.  It's confusing to 
type in a web address, have the page load, and then have the url you just typed 
erase on its own.

Comment 20

[Peter "jag" Annema]

for about:blank which clearly shows a blank page?

Comment 21

[Blake Ross]

I think so, yes.

Comment 22

[Peter "jag" Annema]

How is it confusing? It's not as if you type just any URL and have that
disappear

You type "about:blank", get an empty page with an empty location field and are
ready to go, as if you just opened a new browser window. I prefer that above the
behaviour suggested here.

mpt: implementing (1) is easy (3 line change to the above patch), though I'm not
in favor of it, (2) will require back-end changes, since "about:blank" is
ignored in browser history, though if you can convince people (in another bug)
it's really a good thing to keep "about:blank" pages in browsing history, the
fix to (1) will take care of (2) too.

Comment 23

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

> How is it confusing? It's not as if you type just any URL and have that
> disappear

Exactly. It doesn't happen with any other URL, so it shouldn't happen with 
about:blank either.

URLs are an unfortunate technical-level part of the UI
<http://www.useit.com/alertbox/990321.html>, which is why I this bug in the first 
place -- we shouldn't be showing them to the user when they are just opening a 
new window and clearly have no interest in what the URL for that is. But if the 
user enters about:blank into the address field, then they obviously *are* 
interested in the URL, and to delete it is impolite.

> You type "about:blank", get an empty page with an empty location field and are
> ready to go, as if you just opened a new browser window. I prefer that above
> the behaviour suggested here.

Ready to go what? If you want to enter a new address, you won't bother to enter 
about:blank first anyway. Somehow I suspect you only prefer it because it 
requires less code. :-)

Comment 24

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Attachment: [patch] How about this? :-)

Comment 25

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

Ooh, a whole three more lines! :-)

This would solve (1) but not (2), correct? So (2) should probably be a separate 
bug.

Comment 26

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Your suspicion is incorrect :-)

As for the "ready to go", one step in that was actually having the blank page to
start from, though I'm sure all cases I can think of will be dismissed as far
fetched and countered with "so just open a new window if you really want that",
so nevermind that.

I wonder what exactly a user is "clearly interested" in when they type
about:blank and then press enter (note: if they only type about:blank, it will
just stay there ;-) ).

I'm saying the user is interested in the blank page, not the url that leads to
it. The empty urlbar emphasizes "blank page" better than "about:blank" does, in
my opinion.

Comment 27

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

> I'm saying the user is interested in the blank page, not the url that leads to
> it. The empty urlbar emphasizes "blank page" better than "about:blank" does, in
> my opinion.

If that was true, then as soon as any page loads, we should replace the URL in 
the address field with the title of the page. Obviously we don't do that.

Comment 28

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Attachment: [patch] *cough* *cough*

Comment 29

[Peter "jag" Annema]

1) I suck

I should have put |hideAboutBlank = false;| in the |if (hideAboutBlank)| part of
that if statement.

2) You tell me

Slight rewrite, moving the locationField variable into the XULBrowser object,
have a throw-away function which is only executed the first time so the penalty
of this check happens only once.

Comment 30

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Attachment: [patch] This is either beautiful, or really ugly

Comment 31

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

*** Bug 59997 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 32

[Peter "jag" Annema]

Attachment: [patch] more straight-forward way.

Comment 33

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

So after five attempts, is your latest patch of check-in quality? :-)

I have seen several disparaging references to this bug by people discussing 
Netscape 6.

Comment 34

[Blake Ross]

jag checked this in today.

Comment 35

[Peter "jag" Annema]

mpt: so where's this new bug on history actually remembering about:blank? ;-)

Checked in the last fix, marking fixed  :-)

Comment 36

[sairuh (rarely reading bugmail)]

hokay this is what i tested for: using mpt's orginal steps of setting the pref
to open to a blank page, then restarting the app. my observations [using
2000.11.21.08 for winnt/linux and 2000.11.21.13 for mac]:

a. after restarting the app, the startup page is indeed blank *and* the URL
location field is empty. cool.

b. being the curious creature that i am, i then clicked the Home button in the
personal toolbar. what happened is that 'about:blank' appears [albeit briefly]
in the URL location field, then is replaced by the actual url i have set under
Home Page Location [in the Navigator prefs panel].

if this bug only covers (a), that's cool and i'll go ahead in verify this.

however, please let me know if this bug has morphed, or if there's another bug
filed to cover (b) [or, if i should go ahead a file a new one if it doesn't
exist]. thx!

Comment 37

[Peter "jag" Annema]

I was just looking at exactly that code :-) And I was expecting the behaviour
you described under (b). Fear not, it will be going away RSN, no need to file a
new bug or morph this one.

Comment 38

[sairuh (rarely reading bugmail)]

cool, thx jag!

i'll verify (b) with the next round of verification builds. o'course am on
vacation till next week, so if anyone is eager to do this earlier, go ahead. but
i don't think there's a rush. :)

Comment 39

[Kathleen :Brade]

*** Bug 60970 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 40

[Kathleen :Brade]

(for completeness... adding this here...  personal note:  HURRAY!!!! :) )
The text below is from Jim Thomason at http://www.macintouch.com/netscape6.html:

If you set navigator to start up with a blank page, they contain 'about:blank'
in the URL bar. An interesting gimmick, I suppose, but it completely ruins
opening a new window and blindly pasting a URL into it, as I am prone to do.
Pasting a URL into NS6 tacks it on after the 'about:blank', so you have to
delete that from the URL, then paste the correct URL in.

Comment 41

[sairuh (rarely reading bugmail)]

part (b) [see above] vrfy'd fixed using 2000.11.29.09 comm verif bits on linux,
winnt and mac. thx, jag!