537536 - Incorrect startup page

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(Firefox :: Session Restore, defect)

Description

[Colin Howard]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-GB; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091102 Firefox/3.5.5 GTB6 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-GB; rv:1.9.1.5) Gecko/20091102 Firefox/3.5.5 GTB6 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)

Startup attempts to open the final page of the previous session instead of the default home page, often failing to complete the process when the previous session was Gmail.

Reproducible: Sometimes

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Running Vista Home Basic with 8 user accounts. Three accounts use Firefox as default browser.
2.Vanilla start
3.Invoke Firefox from quicklaunch bar
4.Don't normally multitask on startup so no special consideration of other active programs necessary.
5.No "new" programmes added in the recent past.
Actual Results:  
The final page of the previous session is opened when Firefox is invoked.
If the page opens successfully the lapsed time is quite noticably longer than normal.
If the previous session involved Gmail, then the "oops, this is embarassing" page is produced so a new session is chosen.
When a new session is selected it correctly opens the default startup page.


Expected Results:  
Open the default startup page "home" which is Google news UK.

Comment 1

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

Did you close firefox down incorrectly or did it crash the last time you used it?

Comment 2

[Colin Howard]

Normal shutdown but with more than one open tab.
Generally, the normal restart is the following day as operations on the computer were just closed down at the end of a day.
As it doesn't happen every time it is difficult to "force" the error with any certainty and subsequently also difficult to remember the precise circumstances of every shutdown.
I sometimes quit firefox and then fairly rapidly decide to make another web enquiry so I relaunch from the quickstart bar. Often, the result is a warning that firefox is already running and that I must shut it down so I just wait for a little longer and try again.
I never leave my account in an active condition when I allow another user to access their own account. If they then decide to end their own session and ask if I have anything active in my own account I will often permit them to just "shut down" the computer as opposed to just their own session.
Obviously I am assuming that the normal termination of other accounts during this process is not a fundamental flaw as there is no data to be lost.
I will experiment further and see if these are related issues

Comment 3

[Colin Howard]

(In reply to comment #1)
> Did you close firefox down incorrectly or did it crash the last time you used
> it?

Sorry, I'm a little new to this so I have already partially answered this comment once directly to you and a second time with my own follow-up comment.

I have now tested the fault to destruction and can confirm the following conditions:-

1. My own user account is left open with Firefox running multiple open tabs, including Gmail.
2. From my administrator account I then shut down the computer.
3. Switch on.
4. Opening Firefox from my own user account slowly restores the previous session even though my startup option is to open my home page.
5. Both single and multiple tab sessions are restored.
6. If the previous session includes a tab with Gmail then the restore generally fails, providing the "Oops, this is embarrassing" restore error message.
7. A number of permutations with single and multiple tabs, including and excluding Gmail were expedited.
8. At this point my own environment became unstable because I inadvertently chose the restore instead of new session option.
9. As a result, all local user Firefox close and computer shutdowns simply produced a previous session restore with the "Oops" error when Firefox was restarted.
10 It was necessary to reset the startup options first to "Blank page", close Firefox and subsequently restart Firefox and reset to "Home page" to restore normal Firefox startup operations.

Comment 4

[Paul O'Shannessy [:zpao] (not bugmail, email directly)]

(In reply to comment #3)
> (In reply to comment #1)
> > Did you close firefox down incorrectly or did it crash the last time you used
> > it?
> 
> Sorry, I'm a little new to this so I have already partially answered this
> comment once directly to you and a second time with my own follow-up comment.
> 
> I have now tested the fault to destruction and can confirm the following
> conditions:-
> 
> 1. My own user account is left open with Firefox running multiple open tabs,
> including Gmail.
> 2. From my administrator account I then shut down the computer.
> 3. Switch on.
> 4. Opening Firefox from my own user account slowly restores the previous
> session even though my startup option is to open my home page.

The way you're describing things seems to imply that the browser is not being shut down cleanly (eg, the process is getting killed). If you are ending a user session, there's a good chance that the process is just getting killed (if a Firefox prompt is left open the application doesn't just exit when Windows tells it to, it's waiting user feedback - probably the "you're closing multiple tabs" dialog).

When Firefox doesn't quit cleanly, we try to restore the browser at startup as it was when it crashed (regardless of homepage settings).

> 5. Both single and multiple tab sessions are restored.
> 6. If the previous session includes a tab with Gmail then the restore generally
> fails, providing the "Oops, this is embarrassing" restore error message.
> 7. A number of permutations with single and multiple tabs, including and
> excluding Gmail were expedited.

You're Gmail specific problem is probably because of the order that you're testing this. On the third resume from "crash" in a row, we show the "oops" page.

> 8. At this point my own environment became unstable because I inadvertently
> chose the restore instead of new session option.
> 9. As a result, all local user Firefox close and computer shutdowns simply
> produced a previous session restore with the "Oops" error when Firefox was
> restarted.
> 10 It was necessary to reset the startup options first to "Blank page", close
> Firefox and subsequently restart Firefox and reset to "Home page" to restore
> normal Firefox startup operations.

This would have cleared the multiple crashes state, since here you are actually quitting Firefox.

Question before I offer something to help: Do you normally get a dialog when you try to quit Firefox (normal quit with multiple tabs, not ending a Windows session)? If so, this makes my theory pretty likely.

Something to try: If you always want a new browser session (with your homepage setting), check the "don't ask again" checkbox when you quit next time.

Comment 5

[Colin Howard]

(In reply to comment #4)
Settings are for no warning of multiple tabs on shut-down and has also previously been advised not to ask me again - which was the main reason I thought it likely to be a bug. - Sorry, you're not getting away with it that easily:-)
> (In reply to comment #3)
> > (In reply to comment #1)
> > > Did you close firefox down incorrectly or did it crash the last time you used
> > > it?
> > 
> > Sorry, I'm a little new to this so I have already partially answered this
> > comment once directly to you and a second time with my own follow-up comment.
> > 
> > I have now tested the fault to destruction and can confirm the following
> > conditions:-
> > 
> > 1. My own user account is left open with Firefox running multiple open tabs,
> > including Gmail.
> > 2. From my administrator account I then shut down the computer.
> > 3. Switch on.
> > 4. Opening Firefox from my own user account slowly restores the previous
> > session even though my startup option is to open my home page.
> 
> The way you're describing things seems to imply that the browser is not being
> shut down cleanly (eg, the process is getting killed). If you are ending a user
> session, there's a good chance that the process is just getting killed (if a
> Firefox prompt is left open the application doesn't just exit when Windows
> tells it to, it's waiting user feedback - probably the "you're closing multiple
> tabs" dialog).
> 
> When Firefox doesn't quit cleanly, we try to restore the browser at startup as
> it was when it crashed (regardless of homepage settings).
> 
> > 5. Both single and multiple tab sessions are restored.
> > 6. If the previous session includes a tab with Gmail then the restore generally
> > fails, providing the "Oops, this is embarrassing" restore error message.
> > 7. A number of permutations with single and multiple tabs, including and
> > excluding Gmail were expedited.
> 
> You're Gmail specific problem is probably because of the order that you're
> testing this. On the third resume from "crash" in a row, we show the "oops"
> page.
> 
> > 8. At this point my own environment became unstable because I inadvertently
> > chose the restore instead of new session option.
> > 9. As a result, all local user Firefox close and computer shutdowns simply
> > produced a previous session restore with the "Oops" error when Firefox was
> > restarted.
> > 10 It was necessary to reset the startup options first to "Blank page", close
> > Firefox and subsequently restart Firefox and reset to "Home page" to restore
> > normal Firefox startup operations.
> 
> This would have cleared the multiple crashes state, since here you are actually
> quitting Firefox.
> 
> Question before I offer something to help: Do you normally get a dialog when
> you try to quit Firefox (normal quit with multiple tabs, not ending a Windows
> session)? If so, this makes my theory pretty likely.
> 
> Something to try: If you always want a new browser session (with your homepage
> setting), check the "don't ask again" checkbox when you quit next time.

Comment 6

[Colin Howard]

(In further reply to comment #4)


You may not have noticed the use of the phrase "ALL local Firefox close...". I actually had three or four erroneous "restore" start-ups following clean shut downs within the local session. The error was persisting even after I stopped forcing it and was only remedied when the system was stabilised by the "flushing out" of the start-up options, as defined below.

I would have expected the multiple correct shut-downs to have cleared the multiple crashes state, making the constant varying of start-up options unnecessary.

> > 9. As a result, all local user Firefox close and computer shutdowns simply
> > produced a previous session restore with the "Oops" error when Firefox was
> > restarted.
> > 10 It was necessary to reset the startup options first to "Blank page", close
> > Firefox and subsequently restart Firefox and reset to "Home page" to restore
> > normal Firefox startup operations.
> 
> This would have cleared the multiple crashes state, since here you are actually
> quitting Firefox.
> 
> Question before I offer something to help: Do you normally get a dialog when
> you try to quit Firefox (normal quit with multiple tabs, not ending a Windows
> session)? If so, this makes my theory pretty likely.
> 
> Something to try: If you always want a new browser session (with your homepage
> setting), check the "don't ask again" checkbox when you quit next time.

Comment 7

[u279076]

It might be interesting to see how "gracefully" other browsers handle this scenario, and other software for that matter.  Not to point the finger at others but it would certainly be important to know if Windows was not cleaning shutting down its own sessions.

Comment 8

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Colin do you still see this issue when using a current version?

Comment 9

[Colin Howard]

I stopped using FIREFOX so I really have no idea. Sorry :(.
(In reply to Wayne Mery (:wsmwk) from comment #8)
> Colin do you still see this issue when using a current version?