441717 - "Firefox is already running, but not responding" message is not always accurate

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Toolkit :: Startup and Profile System, defect)

Description

[Thomas Rutter]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9) Gecko/2008052906 Firefox/3.0
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9) Gecko/2008052906 Firefox/3.0

The message on startup "Firefox is already running, but not responding" is sometimes triggered on startup even when this is not actually the case.

It is triggered when

- You have recently closed Firefox and are trying to open it again before it has completed its background shutdown procedures

- The profile folder is missing or corrupt, or the drive it was on has been removed



Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Close Firefox (using a profile with a good amount of bookmarks and history).
2. Immediately double click the Firefox icon to open it again.

-or-

1. Remove the profile folder or disconnect the drive it is on (if not in the default location).
2. Try to start Firefox with that profile.
Actual Results:  
"Firefox is already running, but not responding" message is shown.

Expected Results:  
Message should be more accurate to the circumstances ie:

- "Your previous Firefox session has not finished shutting down" along with a throbber and/or a retry button.

or

- "Your Firefox profile appears to be missing or corrupted" along with a button to open the Profile Manager and set up a new profile.

Comment 1

[Manuj]

Did you try in the safe mode???

Start-> All Programs-> Mozilla -> SafeMode

Comment 2

[myles7897]

manuj: this is not a problem. It is an enhancement.

Thomas: If I understand you right, you just want an accurate notification, correct? i.e. When you start Firefox and Firefox is still shutting down, you want: "Your previous Firefox session has not finished shutting down".

Comment 3

[Thomas Rutter]

@myles comment #2: That's right.  The existing message is accurate in some circumstances, but not in others, particularly those two I highlighted.  It can make it difficult to know the cause of the problem.

The particular message "Your previous Firefox session has not finished shutting down" may be a good solution.  It would require some sort of file-based flag to be set in the profile specifically while the Firefox instance using that profile is shutting down so that launch process can detect that specifically.

At other times the "Still running but not responding" message could be altered to include the possibility of other causes, like "The user profile could not be loaded.  This may be because Firefox is still running but not responding, or it may be because the Firefox user profile is missing or damaged" possibly accompanied by a button to launch the profile manager.

Comment 4

[Jason Woofenden]

WHAAT?

the proper behavior when you go to open firefox (and there is a firefox process still shutting down) is to OPEN FIREFOX.

As the user I don't give a rats ass about some background firefox process that's shutting down, I want to browse the web, that's why I launched firefox.

If for some strange reason firefox can't start normally while there's an older firefox process shutting down (which is a technical, design issue that users should not have to know about), then it should wait for that process to finish, and then launch firefox.

If this is going to take a long time, or has a possibility of failing, then a temporary notice should be displayed saying why it's taking extra long, and what to do if it never starts. But this notice must not be instead of starting firefox, it must be while firefox is trying to start, and must go away by itself once firefox is actually launched.

Comment 5

[rcasagra]

I get the "Firefox still running...." msg even if has been long time since last used. The only way then to shut down is thru Task Manager. Happens fairly often.

Comment 6

[WADA:World Anti-bad-Duping Agency]

(In reply to comment #0)
> It is triggered when
>(A) You have recently closed Firefox and are trying to open it again before it
> has completed its background shutdown procedures
>(B) The profile folder is missing or corrupt, or the drive it was on has been removed

(B) is DUP of Bug 278860. See bugs DUPed to Bug 278860.
See also Bug 381139 and Bug 459638, which are listed in dependency tree for Bug 278860, for confusing/inaccurate error message.

When (A), it's proper/accurate message, although Fx's current behaviour in termination, close all windows without indication of "termination is in progress", tends to produce user's confusion.
Bug 403623, Bug 444915, Bug 452770, which can be found by search for "open bug, summary contains running AND respond", look to be bugs due to such user's confusion.
I believe that cause of user's confusion in case (A) is combination of followings, as Jason Woofenden says in Comment #4.
 (1) Relatively longer termination time than Fx2 or before
 (2) No indication of "termination is in progress"
AFAIK, bug for (1) already exists(request to make termination faster), but request relates to (2) doesn't exist yet. 
Anyway, case (A) & (1)/(2) should be processed by separate bug.

(In reply to comment #5)
> The only way then to shut down is thru Task Manager.

When previous Firefox never terminates, the error message is accurate.
"Termination of Firefox doesn't complete" is completely different problem from this bug. (This bug is for "inaccurate error message")
To [e-mail]:
Search bugzilla.mozilla.org well for already opened bugs, please.

Comment 7

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

agree with comment 6 (other specific bugs on specific issues) and no response from reporter, so => incomplete

to xref a few
 Bug 488113 -  "running but not responding" should not appear while the previous instance updates extensions
 bug 444915  after closing Firefox, Firefox not listed in taskmanager and startup results in error message "Firefox is already running, but is not responding. ...
 bug 489981 	Launching Firefox twice quickly reproducibly gives "Firefox is already running" error