343720 - master password and proxy authentication is asked repeatedly even though the pages load properly without providing them

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 230190

(Toolkit :: Password Manager, defect)

Description

[Saikat]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.0.4) Gecko/20060508 Firefox/1.5.0.4

As soon as the firefox is started, it asks for the master password (twice). If it is entered, then the proxy authentication dialog comes up with the user id and password already stored. If the master password is not entered and cancel is pressed, then the proxy auth dialog comes up empty. Even if this dialog is cancelled, the pages load properly. So, the browser is capable of contacting the inetrnet without showing these dialogues. Actually, earlier it used to work nicely. Once the proxy auth was done and password was saved in password manager, it didn't use to ask it again and again.

The only thing that has changed in the firewall/proxy being used by the corporate network where I work. Is firefox unable to work with this particular proxy? IE works just as before.

This bug has made use of firefox quite irritating. Please look into this soon. Please let me know if any other info is required.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Start firefox
2.
3.

Comment 1

[leandro]

I like firefox a lot (browser) 
but it has a problem
in occasions it is very annoying
I navigate behind a proxy with authentification
I don't know the reason but in many occasions the firefox requests me time and again the password
even with the saved password
please make something
I have friends that don't use it for that reason

sorry my english

Comment 2

[Gert-Jan Vons]

I think this is the same problem I'm seeing, since at startup of Firefox, I often get 2 or 3 master password dialogs.

This happens with Firefox 1.5.x and 2.0RC, doesn't matter. In my case, Firefox connects to the internet via a password-protected proxy, I have firefox' "automatically check for updates" option enabled, and use the forecastfox plug-in.

My guess is that the problem occurs because multiple threads/components request the proxy credentials from the password manager at the same time, and as long as the master password has not been entered once, any additional request for the proxy credentials causes the password manager to display another master password dialog even if there is already one on the screen.

What is also confusing and annoying is that these master password dialogs are displayed in exactly the same position, and that each new master password dialog steals the focus from the previous one.

I initially thought something was erasing the password I was entering since after 2 or 3 characters typed, the field suddenly was empty again. But it turned out that another master password dialog with an empty password field was displayed exactly on top of it.

The problem with the multiple dialogs is that if you see the first one, enter the password and hit [enter] without looking at the screen, it may be that part of the password went into the first dialog and another part + the enter key into the second. This causes the login to fail and I have to retype my password again.

This is a rather annoying issue, with as only work-arounds afaik:

-  1) waiting until all master password dialogs are on-screen
   2) and then either
      2a) enter your master password multiple times or
      2b) enter your master password once, cancel all other dialogs, and
          manually refresh the web page and forecastfox' weather data.
      In either case you need are many keypresses and mouse-clicks...
- don't use plug-ins that connect to the internet on startup, disable "check for updates"

Concerning the reproduction of this problem: I often see this in the morning when I start firefox for the first time, it doesn't necessarily happen when I stop&restart firefox just after that. It seems to that firefox/forecastfox don't go out to the internet at each startup when they still have sufficiently fresh data.

Comment 3

[Gert-Jan Vons]

I just had to enter the master password *five times* at startup of Firefox :-( 

Windows XPSP2, Firefox 2.0 release, passwd protected internet proxy with username and password saved in Firefox' password manager.

1. I logged off when Firefox still had a couple of tabs open.
2. After logging back on and starting Firefox, it asked me whether or not to restore the previous session. 
3. I selected "restore", and then Firefox asked me 5 times for the master password, as if each tab individually requested the proxy credentials and thus indirectly triggered the master password dialog.

Note that for each master password dialog there was a proxy credentials dialog. This was probably not clear in my previous comment, but when I get multiple master password dialogs, they are always followed by a matching "enter proxy credentials" dialog.

How come that the various proxy credential requests aren't connected?

Not only to the same master password dialog, but preferably also to the same proxy credentials dialog so that I don't have to hit "Ok" five times just to confirm that they can all use the saved proxy credentials.

Comment 4

[Vittorio Moccia]

I find the same bug
The trouble has blown up with Firefox 1.5 and the new 2.0 (Firefox 1.0 on the contrary works fine).
The proxy uthentication password is asked repeatedly when I open a clear session on a tab and an https session on another one.

Comment 5

[u279076]

This is hard to test without access to a password authenticated proxy.  This bug has not been commented on for over 6 months however.  Could the reporter please test this bug using firefox 2.0.0.4?

Comment 6

[Gert-Jan Vons]

I am not the reporter but as I mentioned in comments #2 and #3 I suffer from this problem, and I can confirm I still see this problem almost every day and even with the latest update of Firefox (2.0.0.4). It happens with plug-ins that automatically connect to the internet on startup of FireFox, FF itself checking for updates, and is particularly annoying when you restore a previous session on startup since you may end up getting one pop-up for each tab or so.

Comment 7

[u279076]

So if you tell firefox to run in safemode or with a new profile, you do not experience this bug?  Also, could you please list specific addons?

Comment 8

[Gert-Jan Vons]

IMHO it is not related to my profile or to specific addons, it is just that addons may also request access to the internet, thus provoking a proxy user/pass dialog on startup.

But to eliminate all that from the discussion, I just did the following:

1. downloaded FF 2.0.0.4 installed it on a clean system (FF has never been installed on it)
2. configured the auto proxy configuration URL
3. enabled "when firefox starts - show windows and tabs from last time" (so that I can get a number of requests for proxy authentication on startup)
4. opened 4 tabs (www.mozilla.org, www.freebsd.org, www.slashdot.org, www.microsoft.com)
5. enabled "clear private data on exit" so that pages are removed from cache on exit (thus forcing a http connection to reload them on startup)

6. closed FF
7. opened FF, showed 4 tabs with "loading..."
8. had to enter my proxy username&password 4 times, each one resulted in one of the tabs loading its content

If the "Use master password" is enabled and the proxy credentials are saved (so that the user is requested to enter the master password), I get both an "enter master password" and a "proxy authentication" dialog for each of the 4 tabs (so 8 dialogs total instead of only 2).

It seems that whenever something (a tab displaying a page, an addon, ...)  needs the proxy credentials while they have not yet been entered by the user during this FF session, a new (master password +) proxy authentication dialog is displayed even when such a dialog is already displayed on the screen.

Comment 9

[Justin Dolske [:Dolske]]

Hmm, sounds like we're creating multiple instances of the proxy password prompt, and after one instance gets an input the rest don't get notified.

Comment 10

[salty3dog]

First Post.
I hesitated to register just to add a "Me To" post, but, I have been trying to work around this same bug for several weeks now.

Long story short: after selectively disabling add-ons, I found the problem disappeared when I disabled Google Toolbar. 

On the next reboot the password prompt appeared AFTER FF opened, not before, and it did not fail to open / require multiple responses to finish opening.  

I had been working in safe mode for almost two weeks, but this seems to have fixed it up. Later I will try the Google Toolbar options to see if I can narrow it down, but that toolbar just seems too busy!
n XP sp2 behind corporate firewall

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.8.1.5) Gecko/20070713 Firefox/2.0.0.5