281012 - Closing the last tab loads an untitled page (about:blank) instead; doesn't clear session history

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: Tabbed Browser, defect, P3)

Description

[toontownaholic24]

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

When only one tab is open, and you have Firefox configured to show the tab bar,
even when only one tab is open, when you close the tab by either middle-clicking
it or clicking the close "X" button at the right of the tab bar, it closes the
tab and spawns a tab entitled "(Untitled)" instead of closing the tab only. In
other browsers, like Opera, it closes the tab to a blank window with no tabs.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Tools->Options->Advanced->Deselect "Hide the tab bar when only one tab is open"
2. Open one tab, and only one tab.
3. Middle click the tab.

Actual Results:  
There is a tab named "(Untitled)."

Expected Results:  
The software should have closed the tab and made a tabless browser window.

Firefox should be configured to show the tab bar when only one tab is open.

Comment 1

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

See bug 156082. I don't think it's currently possible to have a tab bar without
a tab (which would be the equivalent of a window without a content area). This
is probably wontfix or invalid.

Comment 2

[toontownaholic24]

Why is it even possible to close the last tab open then? Shouldn't the X button
be removed when there's only one tab open. Shouldn't the middle clicking the tab
also be removed?

Comment 3

[Mark Barnes]

What's worse, when you do something that opens another tab,
that same old blank tab remains, for no reason.

Comment 4

[Grey Nicholson (they/them)]

*** Bug 294261 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 5

[Grey Nicholson (they/them)]

Also the session history doesn't clear, which (I believe) is a symptom of not
"properly" closing the last tab.

This also has a tiny security implication: user is visiting xxx.porno.com, hears
the boss/parent approach, closes the last tab knowing that the boss/parent
doesn't understand History; unfortunately the boss/parent does understand Back;
user fired/grounded.

Comment 6

[Grey Nicholson (they/them)]

Cross-ref bug 236721 comment 21

Comment 7

[Nick_Jenkins]

Good catch, Greg. Yes, applying the changes in bug 236721 comment 21 will fix
this - I've been running with this now for a while, and it works great. Even
better would be applying the changes in bug 236721 comments 20 and 21, which
would fix both that problem and this one. I only wish that getting those fixes
applied to the tree was as easy as creating the fixes in the first place - the
current system (no feedback, no response) only discourages people like myself
from fixing other things or from feeding our fixes back into the project.

Comment 8

[Nick_Jenkins]

Sorry for the bugspam, and a clarification on the above - by "fix this", I mean
it will clear the session history. It'll still leave an about:blank tab though
(i.e. those are two different issues). Personally, I don't think it should be
possible to close this last tab (it should be possible to close the window of
course, but the number of tabs should always be >= 1. Otherwise, if num tabs =
0, what's the point of even having the window open?)

Comment 9

[Martijn Wargers (dead)]

*** Bug 315688 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 10

[Jose A. Blanco]

Nick's solution makes the current Firefox behaviour more consistent, i.e. closing the last tab should have the same effect as really closing it and opening a new one. Otherwise this is confusing for users (that still have a back button active after closign the tab), and for extensions like UndoCloseTab or TabFX that keep track of closed tabs history.

Comment 11

[Ria Klaassen (not reading all bugmail)]

*** Bug 322101 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 12

[Alan Baxter]

I just voted for this bug since the one I reported, bug 322101, has been marked a duplicate of this one.  However bug 322101 does *not* suggest that the tab bar should be removed as this bug does.  bug 322101 says the tab bar should remain with an (Untitled) tab, a cleared session history, and a disabled Back button.  It seems like the change asked for in bug 322101 is implemented in comment 7 made last August but hasn't been submitted yet.

Comment 13

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

+ for investigation along with the other inconsistencies around tab close.

Comment 14

[Simon Bünzli]

Attachment: replace the tab being closed with a new clean tab

The current patch to bug 236721 doesn't fix this issue anymore. And I'm not sure that just purging the tab's history is enough. People might then complain about the apparently "new" tab still retaining extension set attributes.

Why not add a new tab while removing the one to be closed? This shouldn't be visible since the UI thread will be blocked until removeTab returns (at which point the new tab is displayed in lieu of the old one without flickering).

Comment 15

[logan]

Do you need to adjust l after adding the new tab?

    if (this.mPrefs.getBoolPref("browser.tabs.autoHide")) {
      ...
      this.addTab("about:blank");
      l = this.mTabContainer.childNodes.length;
    }

Comment 16

[Simon Bünzli]

Attachment: replace the tab being closed with a new clean tab (take 2)

Thanks for catching that, logan. This patch additionally makes sure that we're not accidentally ending with one blank tab too many (should the content viewer not permit unloading).

Comment 17

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

Comment on attachment 220845 [details] [diff] [review]
replace the tab being closed with a new clean tab (take 2)

this will go in later today

Comment 18

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

mozilla/toolkit/content/widgets/tabbrowser.xml 	1.152
mozilla/toolkit/content/widgets/tabbrowser.xml 	1.103.2.44

Comment 19

[Adam Guthrie]

*** Bug 352917 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***