After updating to firefox 50.0, tab goes black instead of showing web pages

[Thomas Mayer]

Today, I updated firefox to version 50.0. This update was offered to me via the official updates I got for ubuntu 16.04.

After restarting firefox, I get a black tab content when I "open" a web page. For demonstration, see the screen shot attached.

Note that I still can edit preferences or "about:config". Tabs only go black for web pages.

I get the black tabs after installing firefox together with this set of updates:
 isc-dhcp-client 4.3.3-5ubuntu12.4
 isc-dhcp-common 4.3.3-5ubuntu12.4
 libfcitx-config4 1:4.2.9.1-1ubuntu1.16.04.1
 libfcitx-gclient0 1:4.2.9.1-1ubuntu1.16.04.1
 libfcitx-utils0 1:4.2.9.1-1ubuntu1.16.04.1
 libprocps4 2:3.3.10-4ubuntu2.2
 linux-firmware 1.157.5
 procps 2:3.3.10-4ubuntu2.2
 python3-distupgrade 1:16.04.18
 ubuntu-release-upgrader-core 1:16.04.18
 ubuntu-release-upgrader-gtk 1:16.04.18
 unattended-upgrades 0.90ubuntu0.2
 xserver-common 2:1.18.4-0ubuntu0.2
 xserver-xorg-core 2:1.18.4-0ubuntu0.2

Please not that xserver got updated, too.

The behaviour also remains after a reboot.

Other applications, including Thunderbird, do not show similar behaviour.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
Package: firefox 50.0+build2-0ubuntu0.16.04.2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-47.68-generic 4.4.24
Uname: Linux 4.4.0-47-generic x86_64
AddonCompatCheckDisabled: False
ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.1
Architecture: amd64
AudioDevicesInUse:
 USER PID ACCESS COMMAND
 /dev/snd/controlC0: thomas 3212 F.... pulseaudio
BuildID: 20161114144739
Channel: Unavailable
CurrentDesktop: GNOME-Flashback:Unity
Date: Sat Nov 19 15:57:33 2016
Extensions: extensions.sqlite corrupt or missing
ForcedLayersAccel: False
IfupdownConfig:
 # interfaces(5) file used by ifup(8) and ifdown(8)
 auto lo
 iface lo inet loopback
IncompatibleExtensions: Unavailable (corrupt or non-existant compatibility.ini or extensions.sqlite)
InstallationDate: Installed on 2014-11-29 (721 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS "Trusty Tahr" - Release amd64 (20140722.2)
Locales: extensions.sqlite corrupt or missing
PrefSources: prefs.js
Profiles: Profile0 (Default) - LastVersion=50.0/20161114144739 (In use)
RunningIncompatibleAddons: False
SourcePackage: firefox
Themes: extensions.sqlite corrupt or missing
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to xenial on 2016-06-15 (156 days ago)
dmi.bios.date: 12/06/2013
dmi.bios.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.bios.version: A16
dmi.board.name: 023HKR
dmi.board.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.board.version: A00
dmi.chassis.type: 9
dmi.chassis.vendor: Dell Inc.
dmi.modalias: dmi:bvnDellInc.:bvrA16:bd12/06/2013:svnDellInc.:pnLatitudeE5510:pvr0001:rvnDellInc.:rn023HKR:rvrA00:cvnDellInc.:ct9:cvr:
dmi.product.name: Latitude E5510
dmi.product.version: 0001
dmi.sys.vendor: Dell Inc.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

I tried to disable and enable hardware acceleration in preferences and restart firefox, but that did not improve anything.

I figured out that I had

layers.acceleration.force-enabled=true

in about:config tab.

For instance, I've set

layers.acceleration.force-enabled=false

After that, instead of getting black tabs I now get white tabs. The funny thing is, that I can click on invisible elements of the web page, so it is loaded but just not visible.

When I click on invisible elements of the web page it even "opens" the corresponding URL. Just that it is not visible again.

I guess this issue has to do something with graphics acceleration. Or maybe e10s if something changed there.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

When I start firefox from console, I get output like

$ firefox
[GFX1]: Failed 2 buffer db=0 dw=0 for 0, 0, 1920, 876
[GFX1]: Failed 2 buffer db=0 dw=0 for 0, 0, 1920, 876
[GFX1]: Failed 2 buffer db=0 dw=0 for 0, 0, 1920, 876

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

Sometimes I get black and white rectangles when I use other windows (not the firefox window).

Attached is a screen shot of the one of these rectangles. Sometimes multiple rectangles occur. Sometimes they are flickering.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

I also tried enabling and disabling

webgl.force-enabled=true.

webgl.msaa-force=true.

layers.acceleration.force-enabled=true.

But nothing helped. Tabs are still white.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

When I switch focus from the about:config tab to the tab of a web page then the tab of a web page sometimes does not refresh the content. Meaning that the web page's tab is active, but still contains the contents of "about:config".

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

related: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1066226

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

Workaround: I had to enable the firefox plugin "ubuntu modifications" (was disabled before). With the plugin enabled, firefox is running smoothly again, showing all web pages in tabs correctly.

[Nik Mitev (nik-r)]

Hi,

I had the same issue, and 'ubuntu modifications' did resolve it so thanks!

A couple of things to add in case they help:

For me the issue was not triggered by the update itself, but by me
disabling an addon I had installed. Removing or reinstalling/reenabling
the addon after that made no difference. What did help (temporarily) was
removing all profiles.

If Firefox could find no saved profiles when it launches, it worked -
until the next restart of course, because then a profile was already saved.
As for your workaround (thanks again), I'll only add it is a
'recommended package' for me, I cannot install it from within Firefox.
Once installed with 'apt-get install xul-ext-ubufox' it appears as an
installed extension and can be disabled (didn't try) from within Firefox.

Regards,
Nik Mitev

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

After upgrading from FF 51.0.0 to FF 51.0.1, FF now shows me white pages, sometimes with light grey rectangles.

Uninstalling and installing the firefox plugin "ubuntu modifications" does not work around this issue any more.

Currently, I'm not aware of a workaround for that, so I can't use FF for the moment.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

It turned out that this issue was completely apparmor related. I filed a new issue at https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/1659988 , together with a patch which fixes all the issues in my case.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

A patch which is known to fix this issue, is available at 1659988.

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/1659988

Everyone affected, please give it a try (take the latest version of the patch!) and report back.

@Maintainers: This issue duplicates

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/1659922 and
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/firefox/+bug/1627239

or vice versa.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Blanton Radford (blantonradford)]

Repeating post from bug #1659988

Thomas,

I believe I was already on FF 51.0.1, but after my Session Manager addon updated to 0.8.1.13, I began having the issue where everything from the Internet would display as black and white rectangles. I believe this happened immediately, but I can't be sure as I was chasing a separate problem at the time with gmail servers that appears to be a DNS issue (very long traceroute times).

I applied the patch as you described for usr.bin.firefox_patched in post #21, and FF began working again. Thanks for the work you put into the patch!

Reporting the patch is a fix for this bug (1643200)

Using:
Trusty
System76 gazp9 laptop
FF 51.0.1
Session Manager 0.8.1.13

Thomas, as you suggested in 1659988, the Session Manager addon added multiprocess support, i.e. E10s, in the latest version. Apparently, that was the last thing blocking E10s from being enabled, and once it was, I experienced this bug.

Hopefully, someone will post here when this is resolved and the patch you wrote can be removed.

Thanks again!

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

@blantonradford Thanks for reporting back.

That can easily happen: As documented in my previous comments, I had black/white tabs already with FF 50. Most users won't have noticed that because the extension "ubuntu modifications" is installed by default and mitigates this problem for versions _before_ FF51 (or FF51.0.1). However, starting from FF51.0.1 (at least), that extension does not help any more and the issue gets exposed to users.

Technically, you hit this issue as soon as E10S gets enabled, be it via update or updating previously E10S-incompatible extensions (like Session Manager) which then become compatible to E10S and therefore allow FF to enable E10S.

[Thomas Mayer (thomas303)]

@es20490446e By its nature (bug description), this is not a duplicate of bug #1659988 (which is about pyhton3 support). Just that bug #1659988 contains a patch for a number of apparmor related issues.

This is rather a duplicate of bug #1659922.