270551 - browsing and downloading inside plugin finder window causes hang

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Toolkit Graveyard :: Plugin Finder Service, defect)

Description

[Mykel Scappin]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041107 Firefox/1.0
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20041107 Firefox/1.0

While on a typical games website (www.addictinggames.com) the user is prompted
to install various plugins - java, flash and shockwave to name a few - and the
plugin finder begins as usuall. Once the user has told firefox to download
specified plugins, the 'license' window opens and a webpage is loaded inside it.
General browsing in this window appears to be frowneed upon because there are
none of the usual buttons. Anyway, after going to some links I decided to
download the installer file rather than letting Firefox handle it. I browsed to
the appropriate page and clicked the appropriate link. The download manager box
came up, as expected, but what isnt expected is no information in the filename,
location or any other fields. Better than that though, the user (me) cannot
close the download manager window; not by clicking ok (with no information I
found this a tad dangerous) or cancel or even the X close button. Thats all.

Actually on further inspection it appears the bug affects only plugins with
licenses to agree to before downloading. 

Reproducible: Always
Steps to Reproduce:
1. make sure you dont have shockwave plugin installed
2. go to http://www.addictinggames.com/snake3d.html
3. click 'Install missing plugins' 
4. Let the plugin manager tell you about which plugin it'll get for you, click next
5. let the license webpage load in the next window
6. click, for example, downloads on the top bar
7. find, for example, shockwave player and click it
8. find the big "Download Now" button and witness the horror

Actual Results:  
The download manager window opened, with absolutly no information about the file
i was trying to download. clicking "ok" or "cancel" or the closing x button does
nothing. 

Expected Results:  
The download manager should have had file information, and the ok and cancel and
closing X button should have worked.

Comment 1

[Mykel Scappin]

Attachment: screenshot of download manager plugin finder error

this is the problem - there is no data on the file, nor can the ok or cancel or
closing X buttons be made to work. sure, you can CLICK them, but they dont do
anything :P

Comment 2

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

Are you on windows for real or faking your useragent?

Comment 3

[Mykel Scappin]

(In reply to comment #2)
> Are you on windows for real or faking your useragent?

*shock-horror* its for real

Comment 4

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

can you still reproduce this?  It should be showing the macromedia end user
license, not an install page.

Comment 5

[Mykel Scappin]

take a look at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/attachment.cgi?id=166304&action=view . you can see the 
area where the plaintext license should be is a web page area. oh and in that image i have already 
navigated to a different page, not the original (but still webpage based) macromedia license.

Comment 6

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

The license is not plaintext  but rather a webpage.  You should not be clicking
on any links or such.

I guess this should be a bug about not allowing people to click in the license page.

Comment 7

[Mykel Scappin]

You should not be clicking on any links or such

well yes, but it (the webpage) shouldnt be there in the first place. this is a
bug, dont you think?

Comment 8

[edward barbano]

Attachment: shockwave illegal move

have to close Firefox each time then reopen

Comment 9

[Justin Dolske [:Dolske]]

Bug 836415 has now removed the Plugin Finder Service (PFS) from Firefox. As a result, I'm closing all the remaining PFS bugs.

If you're getting this bugmail for an ancient PFS bug, the basic summary of the world today is:

* NPAPI plugins are a dying technology
* PFS was already restricted to assisting with only the 4 most common plugins
* Sites commonly provide their own UI for install a required plugin
* Mozilla is generally focusing on  improving the web platform so that proprietary plugins are not required.

(Note that "plugins" are a completely separate from "browser extensions", such at those found on addons.mozilla.org. The latter are not going anywhere, and are not impacted by the removal of PFS.)