308692 - Opening link in new tab should be suppressed if page being viewed is the home page

Status: VERIFIED WONTFIX

(Camino Graveyard :: Tabbed Browsing, enhancement)

Description

[Warren Young]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X Mach-O; en-US; rv:1.7.8) Gecko/20050427 Camino/0.8.4
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X Mach-O; en-US; rv:1.7.8) Gecko/20050427 Camino/0.8.4

If I have the browser set up to open new web pages requested by another
application in a new tab, I think that behavior should be suppressed in the case
where the browser is currently showing the "home" page.  This indicates that the
browser has just started, and so it's okay to override it with a new page.

If implemented, it might be best if this behavior were optional.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
First, set Camino's tabbed browsing preferences to "Loading a page requested by
another application...Opens a new tab in the frontmost window."

Start Camino.

Start some other program that can process web links, such as an email program.  

Click on a link in that program.
Actual Results:  
Page opens in new tab.

Expected Results:  
Page should open using the existing tab as an exception to the normal rule,
because it is just showing the home page.

Comment 1

[Smokey Ardisson (offline for a while; not following bugs - do not email)]

This is a little similar to bug 248527, which was WONTFIX.  I imagine this falls
in the same camp.

Comment 2

[Chris Lawson (gone)]

I remember that bug. Here's my suggestion for how to make this feature work,
given the restrictions placed on it by the discussion there.

If and only if the page is blank, AND Camino is being sent a URL from an
external application, Camino should re-use the blank page.

Otherwise, "open in new" should do exactly what it says.

cl

Comment 3

[Samuel Sidler (old account; do not CC)]

I agree with comment 2. We should only re-use the window/tab if it is showing a
blank (about:blank) page.

Comment 4

[Smokey Ardisson (offline for a while; not following bugs - do not email)]

I concur with comment 2 also, but that's a separate issue that needs its own bug.

As for *this* bug, home page is real content (just like any other page),
especially for some users, and it shouldn't be replaced unless a user
specifically acts on it.

Comment 5

[Chris Lawson (gone)]

What if the home page is set to blank? (As mine is.)

Reporter, what is your home page set to?

I agree with Smokey that a non-blank home page is valid content that shouldn't
be replaced.

cl

Comment 6

[Warren Young]

First, I agree that about:blank should always be replaced, regardless of the
option setting.

Second, I understand the arguments against always replacing a non-blank page. 
That's why I recommended that this be optional; not everyone will want this
behavior.  In my case, the home page is Google.  It's just something
light-weight that provides more benefit to me than about:blank; most of the time
I open some other page, rather than do a search.

Comment 7

[Torben]

Comment 2 is bug 295858.

IMHO we should only reuse blank pages.

Comment 8

[Smokey Ardisson (offline for a while; not following bugs - do not email)]

I think this should be WONTFIXed.  Mike?

Comment 9

[Smokey Ardisson (offline for a while; not following bugs - do not email)]

Mike, Simon, WONTFIX?