958554 - On Windows intermittent about window sometimes says "Nightly is being updated by another instance"

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Toolkit :: Application Update, defect)

Description

[Mark Côté [:mcote]]

After I do an update of Nightly, the next time I go to About Nightly I usually get the message "Nightly is being updated by another instance".  The next day, when another build is out, it updates (although often with problems, but I imagine that is a separate bug), but then it ends up back with that message after the update is applied.

I am only running one copy of Nightly at a time.

Comment 1

[Mark Côté [:mcote]]

I haven't seen this in the last few Nightly releases.

Comment 2

[Mark Côté [:mcote]]

Spoke too soon, just got it again--and now I know how to reproduce!

Connect an external monitor (not in mirroring mode) to a MacBook Pro (not sure about other devices), launch Nightly, move the window to the external monitor, open About Nightly.  Expected: "Nightly is up to date".  Actual: "Nightly is being updated by another instance".

Opening About Nightly on the built-in monitor acts as expected.

Comment 3

[Mike Conley (:mconley) (:⚙️)]

Wacky...

Ehsan - any idea what's happening here?

Comment 4

[(no longer active)]

Not really, I've never seen that message.

Comment 5

[Emanuele Alimonda]

Just to confirm this, it happens here pretty often as well (Aurora 30.0a2). I'm also a muti-screen user (but I can't confirm that it works correctly and reliably on the built-in display, it would appear to me that it is pretty random, but I may be wrong)

Some times instead of the "____ is being updates by another instance" message, it shows a "Restart to Update" button, which does absolutely nothing when clicked.

Comment 6

[T. Read]

Same here, with just a single monitor (Aurora 30.0a2 and Beta 29).

Comment 7

[Jake Maul [:jakem]]

This happens to me on Nightly (34), Aurora (33), Beta (32), and Release (31) now... seems to be 29 and up, as I did not have the problem upgrading an old Nightly 28 or Aurora 26 up to current... but both started showing this error immediately after.

Does not seem to matter if I open the window on the built-in monitor or the external monitor.

I can definitely say that I was prevented from updating Beta 31 to 32... this did not seem to be cosmetic, but actual breakage.

There are a half-dozen questions on SUMO about this. Some people have luck disabling certain addons, some people safe mode works. Neither worked for me, nor did the "reset firefox" functionality... same problem.

I am concerned because at least in my case, I believe I was stranded on Beta 31. If I had not looked at the About box and seen something strange, I never would have realized I wasn't staying current anymore.

Comment 8

[Robert Strong (they/them - no direct email)]

Brian, could you take a look at this?

Comment 9

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

Yep, I'll take a look.

Comment 10

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

Attachment: patch rev1.

Comment 11

[Jonny Barnes]

I'm still getting this issue on nightly (2014-09-16) running on Yosemite.

Comment 12

[Michał Gołębiowski-Owczarek [:mgol]]

I've never seen this message so far... until now. Now I can't *not* get it. Nightly from 2014-09-16.

I did opt into Electrolysis test drive but even before I agreed the message was there.

Comment 13

[Michał Gołębiowski-Owczarek [:mgol]]

(In reply to Michał Gołębiowski [:m_gol] from comment #12)
> I've never seen this message so far... until now. Now I can't *not* get it.
> Nightly from 2014-09-16.
> 
> I did opt into Electrolysis test drive but even before I agreed the message
> was there.

Sorry, forgot to mention - I'm on OS X Yosemite public beta 3, released yesterday or sth like that.

Comment 14

[Jonny Barnes]

I'm still on Yosemite Public Beta 2, so it isn't something beta 3 introduced.

Comment 15

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

Ah my fix is windows specific, please continue with the review but I'll investigate a second patch relating to OSX.

Comment 16

[Tim Taubert [:ttaubert] (inactive)]

Bug 1068384 is actually about the recent OS X regression.

Comment 17

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

OK I'll convert this one to be windows specific to match my patch and for anyone getting this on OSX, it seems unrelated to app update. I think it's a front-end issue.

Comment 18

[Jan-Ivar Bruaroey [:jib] (needinfo? me)]

I'm on OSX, just pulled from m-c earlier today, and when I run it and go to About Nightly, I see the words "Nightly is being updated by another instance". I haven't tried any updating at all, though I do have my regular release firefox open with another profile in another window.

Comment 19

[Robert Strong (they/them - no direct email)]

(In reply to Jan-Ivar Bruaroey [:jib] from comment #18)
> I'm on OSX, just pulled from m-c earlier today, and when I run it and go to
> About Nightly, I see the words "Nightly is being updated by another
> instance". I haven't tried any updating at all, though I do have my regular
> release firefox open with another profile in another window.
That's bug 1068384

Comment 20

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/mozilla-inbound/rev/3d9ca37ae70f

Comment 21

[Carsten Book [:Tomcat]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/3d9ca37ae70f