626566 - Dictionary keyboard shortcut rarely works correctly

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 301451

(Core :: Widget: Cocoa, defect)

Description

[Richard Newman [:rnewman]]

Noticed this in Twitter, but it also applies to Bugzilla fields.

Mac keyboard shortcut Ctrl-Cmd-D brings up a dictionary popup for the word under the mouse.

In Minefield 2011-01-17, said shortcut works... but usually only applies to the first word of the first line of typing when the text box first gets focus. (E.g., in this text field, "Noticed" gets the popup to start.)

This happens regardless of the position of the mouse (inside or outside text box, over any word) or the cursor.

The text box must have focus, of course.

Steps:

* In this comment field, start typing. Hit Ctrl-Cmd-D hovering over the non-first word. Observe that the first word gets a dictionary popup. Type several lines.  

* Click outside the text box.

* Click back inside and type a non-letter character. Observe that the shortcut does nothing. (!)

* Repeat and type an alphabetic character on a new line. Observe that the shortcut now works... for the first word on the line. Maybe.

I've seen various permutations of bad behavior beyond this -- the popup leaping back to the first word; a definition of an old, deleted word popping up; etc.

Apologies for this bug being very likely misfiled...

Comment 1

[Ashley Bischoff (blog at handcoding.com)]

Dupe of bug 301451?

Comment 2

[Richard Newman [:rnewman]]

(In reply to comment #1)
> Dupe of bug 301451?

I think Bug 301451 is broader than this: Gecko still doesn't support dictionary lookup for arbitrary on-screen text, as does e.g., Safari.

(Why I think the bug is for that: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=301451#c17 .)

I'll leave it up to you folks to figure out whether you want to add a dependency, dupe, or just link... but certainly the current behavior is completely broken, and it would be a shame to have to wait for a full dictionary implementation.