293180 - Firefox Start Page grabs cursor focus for search box

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Websites :: Other, defect)

Description

[Simon Willison]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X Mach-O; en-US; rv:1.7.7) Gecko/20050414 Firefox/1.0.3
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X Mach-O; en-US; rv:1.7.7) Gecko/20050414 Firefox/1.0.3

The default start page for Firefox includes Google's standard JavaScript for
grabbing the cursor and placing it in the search field on the page. When I
launch my browser or a new browser window, I am likely doing so to enter a URL -
having the cursor stolen away from the location field is not useful.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Load up Firefox with the start page set to
http://www.google.co.uk/firefox?client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official

Actual Results:  
The search field grabbed the cursor focus.

Expected Results:  
The focus should have stayed in the location bar.

Comment 1

[Thomas K. (:tom)]

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8b2) Gecko/20050504
Firefox/1.0+

Happens here, and I was going to file this a few days ago but was discouraged. 
This isn't a firefox bug exactly, but since it's the default start page I
suppose it does fit.  There could be an option somewhere to disallow a page to
steal cursor focus.

Confirming.

Comment 2

[Brent]

This problem has bothered me for years.  When the page finishes loading, both Mozilla and Firefox grab the cursor and put it in the first text entry field.  The browser will grab the cursor from anywhere, even from the search input field (the box to the right of the URL input box and the "Go" button).

This behavior has security implications.  Screws up logins.  For instance, in Yahoo mail, can type in my user name, hit tab, and start typing in my password before the page finishes loading.  Soon as the page finishes loading, the browser moves the cursor to the username input box.  That often happens while I am still typing in my password, which means I'm suddenly typing my password in the clear!

Comment 3

[Grey Hodge (jX)]

This is by design. Google's front page has the same behavior.

Comment 4

[Thomas K. (:tom)]

(In reply to comment #3)
> This is by design. Google's front page has the same behavior.

I believe that is the issue here, Google's front page is an optional homepage that is not set by default for users (unless of course they used the Google Toolbar Bundle).  By stealing the focus from the address bar (where it belongs) and putting it in the search bar, Google is encouraging users to type web addresses directly into the search bar.  Perhaps CANTFIX is a better resolution, although that's not an option, because as part of the partnership with Google, Google wants to steal focus and encourage users to type anything (web addresses, search queries, the domain without a .com which previously would have been handled by smart domain guessing) into the search box with the potential to show ads.

This is a privacy issue, and while there is an easy workaround (change the start page after installing, I don't think there's an option to not use Firefox Start in the installer), it's still an issue.

Comment 5

[Grey Hodge (jX)]

This isn't "stealing" focus, this is taking focus on purpose into the search bar. This is a design feature. The default home page is like Google's home page, it's a search page.

CANTFIX isn't a resolution, and even if it were, this CAN be fixed, but won't be because it's not broken, nor accidental. This is on purpose. This is the design of the search page.

Changing your homepage isn't a "workaround" because, again, this isn't an error. If you don't like the default home page, change it. Simple as pie.