310205 - This is a report of a serious bug in the bugzilla problem response area

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[Norm]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.7.10) Gecko/20050716 Firefox/1.0.6
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.7.10) Gecko/20050716 Firefox/1.0.6

There are currently 200 bug reports covering nearly every aspect of the event
model. I strongly support everything that this organization does. I use semantic
design and CSS for layout. I adhere strictly to W3C standards, and check
everything I do against the W3C site and ust the Mozilla on line manual for my
main source of referenc. I believe in the primary principal of keeping the web
free and open. I develop web applications for small businesses to give them the
affordable options to help compete with the major corporations. I would be very
sad to have to put a notice on my sites that say 'This site can only funition in
Internet Explore because FireFox does not support W3C standards for javaScript.
I know IE doesn't support support W3C either, but there are always work arounds,
because at least it works the way their manual says it will, so I can convert
it. With FireFox there is just no way to work around many of the bugs. Web
applications are one of the fastest growing areas in the whole internet
industry. This bug in the system that leaves a key component unfunctional forces
proffessional developers, like myself, into the .net world. That's why there are
so many there already.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Type 'event' into the search window. You have 200 examples already
2.
3.

Actual Results:  
What has not happend, is that moizilla has not taken javaScript seriously. The
consensus on all the forums is that javaScript is just for annoying anamations
that nobody wants, and pop ups and viruses that we are all trying to kill.
Nobody seems to give any thought to the fact that the web can make applications
availble to small business, that perviously could only be used by major
corporations. Things like telecomuting to save traffic problems and the polution
caused by them. But, javaScript is required to make it feasable.

Expected Results:  
There are many pages in this site, like the 'Site Evangelism Project', that are
very sanctamonius about how some developers do not follow W3C statndards
properly and therefore their sites don't render properly in FireFox. I would
expect that you would apply the same level of 'evnagelism' to seeing that
FireFox complies with W3C standards for DOM and javaSrcipt. Or at least
functions as your own manual says it should.

I realize that whoever evaluates this will probably not think of this as a true
'bug'. But I urge you to reconsider. A flaw in the organization that results in
a growing segment of the market being unable to use your product, requires just
as much attention as flaws in the product itself. There are many professional,
like myself, who would love to have options, and not have to chain their clients
to Microsoft. But until this organization gives some priority to these
outstanding bugs, we have no other options. Please let me know when I can put a
link on my site, and all my client sites, to let anyone who comes to them,
download the new W3C complient FireFox and break free from the monopoly. And,
when I can start training other developers how to work in !net (no that's not a
typo).

Comment 1

[u63580]

Which bugs in particular cause you problems?  There are lots of open bugs in
Firfox/Gecko/etc.  That doesn't mean that they won't be fixed, but they are not
yet.  This is the nature of any software project, I'm afraid.

Comment 2

[Norm]

1) These do not function at all:
    e.preventDefault();
    e.stopPropagation();
 
2) Click, focus, and blur events, do no bubble anywhere (they need to bubble 
all the way to the body tag if not stopped), unless your leavening a checkbox 
type of input field, then the focus and blur will bubble to the container. Very 
strange.
 
 (If these two alone were fixed, and you could detect the tab key, and the 
click, events properly I could over ride almost all of the other errors.)
 
3) When an object gets focus a 'blur' tiger fires before the focus trigger so 
it is imposable to track movements
 
4) When you try to do validation of and input after the user moves off of it, 
and you find an error so that you want move focus back. If you have moved off 
the object using a 'click' action the obj.focus() works fine, but if you had 
moved off the object using 'tab' action then the obj.focus() behaves as though 
it were obj.select() and there is no way to deselect the object 
programmatically, very, very strange. Also, there is no way to move the cursor 
within the text object. I don't think that is a W3C standard, but its a darn 
nice feature that IE and most client server systems have
 
5) When you vacate an object using the 'tab' key it is almost impossible to get 
any information from any event trigger other that 'change'. The only way you 
can detect a tab being pressed is on the keydown event, keypressed dies with a 
tab.
 
6) Objects other than text areas and input fields do not handle focus events. 
So you cannot tell when a tab event moves you to a non-input object. W3C has a 
real problem with indexOrder, because there is no way to eliminate objects you 
may not want to stop on. In a data entry form you do not want to be tabbing to 
every image, and the border of DIVs and IFrames. This particular error in 
FireFox makes in impossible to eliminate the indexing problem.
 
7) When you press tab on the last element of a form, you are taken to the 
address window of the browser and no events of any sort, that I can find, fire 
at all (except the 'blur' on the l item you are leaving, if it is one of the 
items that that event fires on). Pressing tab again takes you to the browser 
tool bar, and a third tab will take you back to the first element on the form. 
In semantic development that usually a DIV which is of no use, but at least it 
can be detected. I have wondered if maybe somebody there thought this might be 
a good idea for some reason. If so they are definitely wrong. Events on a web 
form must be contained to that form or it is impossible do develop effective 
client/server applications.
 
There have been many others that I could work around so have not committed them 
to memory as well.
 
I have worked on major systems development for the past 20 years. I understand 
the problems of getting all the bugs out of a behemoth like this. I also 
understand that major deal breaker problems need a high priority. And when 
there are a number of problems in one area, then perhaps a major look at the 
whole area is required. 

The problem, however, does seem to me to be a systemic one in the organization, 
and that is why I reported it as a bug in the first place. Most bugs get fixed 
pretty quickly, but when it comes to JavaScript there seems to be a collective 
yawn from the whole mozilla community, because you don't seem to see the value 
in it. When you even mention a JavaScript problem on any of the forums you are 
treated like some kind of pariah.

Comment 3

[Peter van der Woude [:Peter6]]

If you know this stuff so well, why not submit patches for them ?
I'm sure the help will be appreciated.

Comment 4

[Norm]

I would actually love to contribute to this kind of product, but I know nothing 
about it. I've never worked in C (which is what I've heard this is all written 
in) and my 20 years experience is at the application development level not at 
the systems level. If you were looking for database design, accounting or 
management information systems I'd be your man. I have used all the top systems 
in the world and I know what is needed. Maybe I can do some beta testing when 
someone gets these thing fixed. I’ve spent most of my career pushing the 
leading edge of technology, so I’ve always been good at finding the weaknesses 
of any system, and tracing them back to their root cause.

Right now I have a huge mortgage, three kids in college, and I’m trying to 
start my own business, all by myself. I'm afraid I barely have time for sleep 
as it is. And for an old guy like me, that’s important.

I'm hoping to retire in a few years. At that time I may be able to volunteer 
some time toward worthwhile endeavors like this. But right now I'm just trying 
to keep my head above water. 

Comment 5

[Peter van der Woude [:Peter6]]

(In reply to comment #4)
> I would actually love to contribute to this kind of product, but I know nothing 
> about it. I've never worked in C (which is what I've heard this is all written 
> in) and my 20 years experience is at the application development level not at 
> the systems level. If you were looking for database design, accounting or 
> management information systems I'd be your man. I have used all the top systems 
> in the world and I know what is needed. Maybe I can do some beta testing when 
> someone gets these thing fixed. I’ve spent most of my career pushing the 
> leading edge of technology, so I’ve always been good at finding the weaknesses 
> of any system, and tracing them back to their root cause.
> 
> Right now I have a huge mortgage, three kids in college, and I’m trying to 
> start my own business, all by myself. I'm afraid I barely have time for sleep 
> as it is. And for an old guy like me, that’s important.
> 
> I'm hoping to retire in a few years. At that time I may be able to volunteer 
> some time toward worthwhile endeavors like this. But right now I'm just trying 
> to keep my head above water. 
> 
Any help is welcome.
Just a simple testcase for each and every (DOM) bug makes life a lot easier for
the guys that fix these.
Btw, just backup your profile (to make sure nothing is lost in case something
goes wrong) and download/install FF1.5beta1 or a latest nightly BRANCH build and
you'll probably find quite a few of the bugs you complain about fixed.

This bug has to be resolved invalid because it just adresses too many bugs.

thanks in advance for your help.