590910 - Switching tabs (without changing selection), Start page displayed in preview of switched-to tab disappears (restoring preview of previous msg selection, or blank preview if no msg selection)

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 1729384

(Thunderbird :: Mail Window Front End, defect)

Description

[JG Berson]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.8) Gecko/20100722 Firefox/3.6.8
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.8) Gecko/20100802 Thunderbird/3.1.2

Prior to this version, the mail start page loaded at startup of TB and remained visible when the last messages were loaded into the inbox.  It would disappear only when the first email is opened to read; which is the expected and desired result.

With the new version (V3.1.2) the mail start page disappears as soon as the last email enters the inbox, and before any message is opened to read. 

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Define a web based site as the mail start page in account settings
2. Start TB and auto download email from server.  Defined site properly appears in the message pane.
3. Watch it disappear when the last message is loaded into the inbox.
4. Alt-Home does not bring it back, but clicking on "go mail start page" does.
Actual Results:  
see above

Expected Results:  
The mail start page should remain on screen after all mail is loaded and only until the first message is opened to read.
Alt-Home should have brought it back as well, but did not.

Previous versions of TB worked as expected.

This is NOT an Alt-Home problem as reported elsewhere.

Comment 1

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

WFM with Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.5; rv:2.0b5pre) Gecko/20100826 Shredder/3.2a1pre. Can you try in -safe-mode (http://support.mozillamessaging.com/en-US/kb/Safe+Mode) ?

Comment 2

[JG Berson]

Strangely, Thunderbird is not listed in my "all programs" start menu.  Firefox is, but not TB.  And I see no reference that I recognize in TB's directory to start safe-mode.

Could you please tell me how to start TB in safe-mode manually?

BTW, yesterday, just once (in 3 TB starts), the mail start page stayed onscreen.
Today it disappeared as noted above.

jgb

Comment 3

[JG Berson]

Ignore that please.  Just found TB in "start" at the top.  It was not in "all programs" but was at the top left corner with Firefox and Win.Explorer.
I had no mail today so I could not test it in safe mode.  Will try on Mon am.

jgb

Comment 4

[JG Berson]

Monday am.  Booted TB in safe mode.  Mail start page vanished as soon as the last incoming message loaded into its inbox.

FYI; I have 2 inboxes and 3 tabs open at startup.  My 3 tabs are; my main inbox, the wifes inbox and the main junk folder.  It doesn't seem to matter which tab is active during the initial mail download of about 30 - 50 items total.

jgb

Comment 5

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

What page did you define as you start page ?

Comment 6

[JG Berson]

My mail start page is...   http://www.680news.com

Been using it for years with no problems before this TB version upgrade.
It comes up normal as before, but vanishes as the last email is downloaded.
I can bring it back with "go""mail start page"  (But NOT "alt-home")

jgb

Comment 7

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

I get it blank if I switch folders after a new mail arrives. But I need to switch folders.

Are your account POP accounts ?

Comment 8

[JG Berson]

I don't need to switch accounts for it to vanish.  I just sit back and let it load then watch the start page disappear.  Even if I am scrolling the start page, it will disappear.  I haven't noticed it go blank after a new round of mail (update is 10 minutes, I think) because a mail item is on display in that pane.  Mail does not disappear from the pane when new mail arrives.

My POP account is POP.ym.phub.net.cable.rogers.com

Comment 9

[Ludovic Hirlimann [:Usul]]

Wayne could you give this a quick try ?

Comment 10

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

I can't reproduce

Comment 11

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Reporter do you still see this problem when using recent version of
Thunderbird?

Comment 12

[JG Berson]

Yes, the problem still occurs even with the latest TB version. However only on my main inbox.  If I am looking at either of the 2 other tabs when starting TB first time of the day, the start page remains. Going back to the main (1st tab) the start page is blank. 

A few months back I changed to a new PC importing the TB config from the old HD and the problem remains.  OS changed from XP Home to XP Pro as well. I totally shut down the PC at end of day.

Also, after going through the mail, I close TB to do other stuff. When I restart TB later in the day the start page stays up like it's supposed to.

l'm sorta used to it now.

Comment 13

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

I don't think there's anything we can do here because nobody has been able to reproduce this bug. Even for reporter, it is intermittent (or perhaps gone with new version). Reporter is using imported TB config, perhaps there's an inherited flaw somewhere.

So it's worksforme - "all efforts to reproduce have been futile"

Comment 14

[JG Berson]

This is no longer a real problem to me, just an irritant.  I've learned to live with it.

However I noticed something more that may be a clue, if there is any interest in pursuing it.

I said before, the web page disappears when the last email loads in my primary (of 3) tabs.  The other 2 tabs seem unaffected.  It is NOT on the LAST email.  

It is when the spam filter completes the inbox scan.  Recently I've been getting a huge amount of spam where I have filters set, so there is a noticeable delay after the last email loads as the filters are polled.  
THEN the web page disappears.

So if this helps, carry on, if not, no biggie!

Comment 15

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

(In reply to JG Berson from comment #14)
> However I noticed something more that may be a clue, if there is any
> interest in pursuing it.

Not really, because it's very unlikely that this is a bug in TB, and you seem to be the only one affected by it (1), it's minor and we cannot reproduce it so there's really not much we can do.

> It is when the spam filter completes the inbox scan.  Recently I've been
> getting a huge amount of spam where I have filters set, so there is a
> noticeable delay after the last email loads as the filters are polled.  
> THEN the web page disappears.

So you are saying it is first shown in the message preview and then it disappears?
After disappearing, you see what? plain white preview?

OK, JG, can you tell us a bit more about your spam filter? Is it an external program, addon, or a normal Thunderbird message filter that you have set up? If so, can you provide structural details about the filter (not the personal data you're checking for, but the structure of conditions and actions)?

(1) search for start page related bugs
:thun,mail su:start,home su:page
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/buglist.cgi?quicksearch=%3Athun%2Cmail%20su%3Astart%2Chome%20su%3Apage;list_id=5156058

Comment 16

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

(In reply to JG Berson from comment #12)

> Also, after going through the mail, I close TB to do other stuff. When I
> restart TB later in the day the start page stays up like it's supposed to.

So what do you do different or what conditions are different between starting TB when it fails and (re)starting TB when it works?

Comment 17

[JG Berson]

So you are saying it is first shown in the message preview and then it disappears?
After disappearing, you see what? plain white preview?

Yes and Yes.

I use TB's built-in message filters.  I also run AVAST against all incoming mail and when browsing in Firefox.

My usual filters are set to check mainly the "From" or "Sender" "Contains" an email addr, or some consistent identifier.  I send all to my junk folder.  I have found that "From" and "Sender" are distinctive and complimentary.

In some cases I may redirect a good message from / to different folders, depending on the mail content.  In those cases I may usually define other parameters (in addition to "from" or "sender") to the filter.

I have about 40+ filters between 2 accounts.  Many filters look at multiple lines of conditions for junk of similar structure, but most filters are 2 lines ("from" and "Sender" both) directed at specific email sources.

I always cold boot the PC in the morning.  I start TB the usual way, clicking the icon on my Windows screen. When I finish my mail each morning I close TB (exit).  I do not leave it open during my day.  I later (mid afternoon) reopen TB by clicking the icon again.  TB reopens quickly due to the memory resident stub.  It will not clear the message pane of the start page on re-opening, most of the time.

The only condition that is "different" from morning to afternoon is in the morning TB is the very first app I open manually after the IPL.  In the afternoon, I usually have 1 or 2 apps open when I check my mail.

Anything else you want to know, just ask.

Comment 18

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

1) JG, can you test if your problem occurs without using AVAST on your mail?
2) Can you test if your problem occurs when you switch off all your filters (but with AVAST on)?
3) Can you test if your problem occurs when you switch off both AVAST and filters?
4) Where is the focus in TB when you see the blank preview pane?
5) Do you switch between your account tabs before you see the blank preview, or you just start TB and watch that initial tab without interruption and then it disappears?
6) Are you constantly online when the start page goes away?

I wonder under which conditions the preview pane can turn plain-white.
To my knowledge, this happens only when there was something in the display before which is no longer available, and nothing new has been selected for display. E.g. if you preview one msg, then Ctrl+Click on that same msg, preview pane will turn white.

However, I am unable to relate this to this bug. The user's start page from the web is still available (online), and until user clicks on a msg or something else to be shown in preview it should not go away. I don't know if filters or AVAST perhaps temporarily do something that would affect the preview. I'm not running AVAST, but I'm running filters and it doesn't happen to me. Perhaps AVAST affects focus or selection in a way that TB does not expect.

Comment 19

[JG Berson]

1 - AVAST looks at my mail inflow before it actually gets into my inbox.  If any malware is detected I get a warning, and it sequesters that item, till I decide its fate.  So I doubt AVAST has any play in this problem.
2 - I will try this for tomorrow mornings IPL.
4- When I start TB I normally just watch the screen showing my primary tab which has the problem.  The Start page displays during the mail down load, then poof. Only then do I switch tabs. 
5 - This morning I quickly switched to my secondary tab, (before the server link was established) which displays the same start page, and it stayed up after the down load.  When I clicked to the primary tab, the pane was blank.
6 - Online is always up.  I leave the modem and WIFI router on 24/7.  Only the PC is turned off at end of day.

For tomorrow I will do the following....
1 - turn off my filters.  Believe me, that is a pain as I normally get about 50 to 75 junk mails each day.
2 - swap account tabs for TB to start. (2nd tab in pos. 1, prime tab in pos. 2)  Maybe that has something to do with it???  If there is a difference, I will restore 1 for Tues am.

Comment 20

[JG Berson]

OK, here's what happened.  A very different result from normal.....

I did NOT turn off AVAST.
I could not find a way to turn off the filters, other than unchecking each and every one.  Too many to bother with.

I have 3 tabs open all the time.  I swapped the mailbox in the primary tab with the 2nd tab, and closed TB while in the primary tab, as usual.

When TB opened this am, displaying the primary tab, the Start Page did NOT appear at all.  Blank pane.  Normally the start page is up till the last mail item is filtered.

When I clicked on the 2nd tab, the start page was there, as usual.  Same with the 3rd tab.

BUT, when I went back to the 2nd tab, the pane was blank, and when I went back to the 3rd tab, it too was blank.  I did NOT select any mail items at all, nor did I click on anything other than the tabs.  This was very unusual.  The start page was always there in the 2nd and 3rd tab panes.

I went to the primary tab,"GO" "Start Page" and the start page came up as normal.

I can see that you guys not having MY PC in your hands may never find the culprit.  There is an inconsistent error, and I know how hair-pulling that can be to debug.  Bin-dere Dun-dat.  
Nor am I willing to spend the time sleuthing this on my own, even with your guidance.

Thanks for the help, but as I am seemingly the only one affected, it is not worth any of us spending additional time on it. So I am suggesting we close this incident, and I will live with the minor irritant.

jgb

Comment 21

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

JG, thanks for your great cooperation and understanding, and your willingness to let this rest if it's too much work for an assumedly individual, mostly non-reproducable case. That attitude is something rare, and I truly appreciate. In fact, you tried so hard that you really deserve this issue to be on record. And your final comment 20 (with a lot of goodwill and intuition from my side) was the key to successful reproduction. So here we go ;)

STR

0) Inbox A = Pop3 Inbox (self-contained, not mixed with other accounts), with some TB message filters that will filter messages away into other subfolders of Inbox upon arrival, and the default TB start page defined.

1) Select Inbox A.
2) Within Inbox A, select msg1
-> msg1 now showing in preview of Tab1

3) Right-click on Inbox A > Open in new Tab
-> Tab2 opens in foreground, also showing msg 1 (so the only change of display is that Tab2 is now selected).

4)a) Click on Tab1 and verify Inbox A, msg1 is showing.
  b) Click on Tab2 and verify Inbox A, msg1 is showing.
-> that's the expected behaviour for swapping between identical tabs.

5) Click on Tab1, then close TB using red [x] close-button in upper-right corner (other ways might also work, but I didn't try).

6) Wait until TB has unloaded, then restart TB.
-> you will now see TB start page in Tab1 (as expected).
7) Click on Tab2
-> you will now see TB start page in Tab2 (as expected).
Iow, after restart, both tabs are initially correctly showing exactly the same thing, namely TB start page.

8) Click back on Tab1
-> preview pane of Tab1 is now blank (plain-white), no longer showing TB start page (this bug)
9) Click back on Tab2
-> preview pane of Tab2 is now blank (plain-white), no longer showing TB start page (this bug)

Actual Result

- As described in STR 7, after (re)start of TB, start page initially shows correctly on Tab1 and Tab2 (because user did not select anything else).
- As described in STR 8-9, switching between tabs (without otherwise selecting anything) makes the TB Start Page disappear from both previews of Tab1 and Tab2, and previews turn blank (unexpected and wrong, this bug).

Expected Result

Switching tabs (without selecting anything) should not affect or alter the display of those tabs in any way.


It's certainly minor for this particular case, but it's clear that we're doing something wrong when switching tabs which alters the selection (or whatever else) and makes Start Pages disappear without respective user intervention to cause that.

Comment 22

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

FTR, it probably doesn't matter for reproduction which page you pick for the TB start page (Tools > Options > General > Thunderbird Start Page), but I tested with TB's current default start page:
https://live.mozillamessaging.com/thunderbird/start?locale=en-US&version=17.0&os=WINNT&buildid=20121116131442

Comment 23

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Suspected cause:

- we probably check at TB startup time when loading tabs initially, if there's a TB start page we are supposed to show, and show that correctly in all respective tabs.
- when switching tabs, we no longer check if we are currently showing a user defined Web page in the preview of switched-to tab (like the TB start page shown at startup), so we just check for selected messages and if there are none, we turn the preview blank (which is probably correct for all other situations except at startup time or any other time when we're showing a web page like TB start page in preview and not a msg).

In fact, here's reduced and restartless STR:

(Standalone POP account with View > Folders > All)
a) show same inbox A with preview of same msg1, in 2 tabs (tab1 and tab2)
b) in tab1, press Alt+Home to show TB start page
-> TB start page correctly showing in preview of Tab1
c) in tab2, press Alt+Home to show TB start page
-> TB start page correctly showing in preview of Tab2
d) switch back to tab1
-> TB Start page gone, showing msg1 again (previous selection).
e) switch back to tab2
-> TB Start page gone, showing msg1 again (previous selection).

The only difference in the startup scenario is that there is no previous msg selection yet, so we're showing blank previews instead.

Actual result
- when switching tabs, we restore previous msg selection (whichever, or none) and show that in the preview, without prior checking if there was a web page (or whatever else) currently displayed in the preview.
- Web page currently shown in preview disappears, which is unexpected because user just switched tabs (without reselecting msg1)

Expected result
- just switching tabs should never affect the display of that tab in any way (ux-mode-error, ux-consistency, ux-control)
- when switching tabs, first check if there is a web page (or whatever else) currently displayed in the preview of switched-to tab
- only if there is nothing else currently displayed in the preview, show the current msg selection in the preview.

Something along those lines. A lovely minor thing which adds another little aspect to bug Bug 487386 where we don't preserve exactly what is shown in tabs when switching between them. In fact, we could dupe this to bug 487386, which is currently a little cesspool for those things. Given reproducable STR and assumedly limited scope here, I'll add it as a dependant for now.

Comment 24

[JG Berson]

Thomas
Thanks for "keeping it alive".
Keep in mind, to the best of my recollection, the start page disappearance in the 2nd and 3rd tabs going backwards never happened before.  I have never done that exact sequence of tab switching before.

Normally I open TB on tab #1, (my inbox) and wait for all mail to load.  When the start page vanishes, I click on the 3rd tab (Junk folder) and read the start page there.  Then I scan the folder for "good" mail accidentally junked.  Some mail I get looks like junk to TB, so I just "not junk" it back to my inbox.  I usually define a filter to prevent junking from that source, or add the senders name to my address book.

When done I click on the 2nd tab (wife's inbox) and the start page is still there.  I then clear her inbox of junk that got through.

Then finally I click on tab #1 (my inbox) and clear out junk, before opening anything that matters.  When completely done, I exit TB.

POR
jgb

Comment 25

[JG Berson]

This am I booted TB in my normal fashion, in 1st tab (my inbox).
When last email was filtered the start page went bye-bye.
I clicked on the 3rd tab (junk folder) as usual, Start page was up.

I then clicked on 2nd tab (wife's inbox) and the start page was up, as usual.

I went back to 3rd tab and the pane was blank.
Going back to the 2nd tab, it too was blank.  
I did this just to check, and then carried on as usual.

jgb

Comment 26

[JG Berson]

Fixed or Fluke?????

Today I booted normal and LO..... The start Page remained up.

I updated TB to 17.0.2 yesterday (I think) so I guess tomorrow will tell the tale.

However, switching to another tab and back again resulted in the start page disappearing, (as usual)

jgb

Comment 27

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Anything in error console?

Comment 28

[JG Berson]

Close this report as it no longer applies.  New versions of Tbird eliminated this bug as far as I can tell.

Comment 29

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

(In reply to JG Berson from comment #28)
> Close this report as it no longer applies.  New versions of Tbird eliminated
> this bug as far as I can tell.

Please don't claim that a bug is fixed if it isn't and you haven't tested the current STR, which is comment 23.
When switching between tabs, any loaded start page will still silently go away, both in release and trunk versions of current Thunderbird.