Clicking File or Bookmarks causes unexpected results

[spinstartshere]

Summary: The page is bookmarked when clicking Bookmarks, which should just open the menu. The original reporter said this happens with File opening New Window as well. Reported with Hardy and Intrepid.

Steps to reproduce:
  1. Open firefox
  2. Click the Bookmarks menu

Expected Result:
  The bookmarks menu opens.

Actual Result:
  The bookmarked dialog immediately appears, as if Bookmark This Page was selected from the menu.

References:
 1. http://launchpadlibrarian.net/18810904/firefox-bookmarks-bug.ogv / Screencast reproducing the bug.

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

Can you retest in safe-mode? http://kb.mozillazine.org/Safe_Mode_(Firefox)

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Created an attachment (id=327164)
Saved bookmarks file associated with the error

This is my saved bookmarks.html file that is associated with the error.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

It still occurs in safe-mode. But when I reset the bookmarks to default, it behaves normally (both in safe-mode and in normal mode). When I import my bookmarks from the saved bookmarks.html file again, the bug appears again. I just attached the bookmarks file FYI.

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

And do you click only one time on the bookmarks-menu button?
I just tried your bookmarks, but I see no difference in behaviour between a new default set and your bookmarks. I can only reproduce the problem when I mousedown on the button, drag down (about 15 pixels) and then release the mouse button.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Yes, I single-click on the Bookmarks menu, and the problem persists even if my mouse is completely still and I release the left mouse button immediately after clicking.

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

And if you use the bookmarks in a new profile?
Sometimes, very rarely, I see something similar with the History menu. I click on it and then the History window opens, not the History menu.

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

I saw this history window problem for the first time when Bug 422528 was reported. The cause of Bug 422528 was Bug 419544.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

When I create a new Windows profile and use the default Firefox bookmarks, there is no error. If I import the bookmarks from my saved HTML file, the error appears again.

Another interesting finding is that it seems that if I click the History menu first after starting Firefox and move the mouse to Bookmarks, then everything seems normal, unlike when I directly click at Bookmarks menu.

My system doesn't have Bug 422528 and Bug 419544.

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

Maybe you could find out what part of your bookmarks is causing the trouble, by deleting folders?

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

I think I've just found the culprit.

Let me explain what I did.

I tried deleting each folder one by one, and the problem still occurred. So I removed each bookmark in the root menu one by one, and the problem went away when the non-English item titled "ระบบกระดานข้อคิดเห็น" (URL: http://www.opm.go.th/opminter/webbrd/index.html) is deleted. (The title is in Thai, btw).

I tried bookmarking this same item again, and the problem reappears. I tried removing some other root bookmarks and adding more, and the problem appears whenever there is that non-English item in the root menu (regardless of what bookmark item I'm adding or removing).

Not believing that the site itself is the problem, I removed this problematic item from the list and tried bookmarking http://www.google.com/ and renaming its title to non-English name (such as "ทดสอบ" in Thai). When I restarted Firefox, Bingo! The problem appeared again. After renaming it back to "Google" the problem disappeared.

So, I believe the culprit is the presence of non-English (Thai, in my case) bookmark in the root folder of "Bookmarks" menu.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Btw, just wondering if it's possible for my attached bookmarks to be deleted once the bug is resolved? I don't want the entire world to be able to see all my bookmarks. Thx

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

Thanks for testing. I bookmarked http://www.opm.go.th/opminter/webbrd/index.html and a lot of other links on this site, but couldn't reproduce the problem. So there should be additional influences and I wonder what other factors might cause this. Problem is that the bug can only be fixed if developers can reproduce the bug consistently.

(In reply to comment #11)
> Btw, just wondering if it's possible for my attached bookmarks to be deleted
> once the bug is resolved? I don't want the entire world to be able to see all
> my bookmarks. Thx
>
There should be people who have administrative rights. By the time you want them to be removed you could contact Mozilla. There are links on the homepage.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Not sure if this is related, but originally I used Firefox's default set of fonts (with Thai added as one of the preferred languages). I visited some other webs and the language display wasn't right, so I changed the fonts for Thai to MS Sans Serif for both serif and sans-serif proportional and changed from Courier New to Courier Mono Thai. Now, the font display for Thai bookmarks in the Bookmarks menu is changed, and the problem is gone...

[Justdave-mozilla (justdave-mozilla)]

The content of attachment 327164 has been deleted by
    Dave Miller [:justdave] <email address hidden>
who provided the following reason:

Requested by submitter in comment 11

The token used to delete this attachment was generated at 2008-06-28 12:10:52 PDT.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

This is to confirm that this bug is still reproducible with the latest Firefox 3.0.1 released today.

From my trial and error, the following conditions have to be met to reproduce the error.

1. Firefox 3 is used (the bug was not present in Firefox 2)
2. There is a bookmark in the root "Bookmarks" menu with a non-English name.
3. The following font settings are used (see attachment). When the sans-serif and serif fonts for Thai language are set to "MS Sans Serif" the problem occurs with a much lower frequency (but still occasionally occurs).

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Created an attachment (id=329947)
Font settings that were found to associate with error reproduction

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

I just ran Firefox 3.0 and 3.0.1 in a virtual machine running Windows XP and it behaves normally even when the font settings are as specified and there is a bookmark with a Thai name at the root bookmarks menu...So this might suggest that the problem only occurs in Vista.

[Xtc4uall (xtc4uall)]

@reporter: isn't it rather an issue like Bug 385036 ?

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Yes, it is similar to Bug 385036 in that when the bookmarks menu is opened for the first time, it takes a long time, but it also bookmarks the current page (as described in Bug 439335).

[Highmind63 (highmind63)]

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-US; rv:1.9.0.1) Gecko/2008070208 Firefox/3.0.1

I can confirm this strange behavior, although I wasn't able to repro reliably in safe mode mainly b/c I haven't spent enough time and this bug is very inconsistent for me.
This occurs randomly with any menu for me (i.e. the History takes me one page back), very annoying.
BTW I don't have any non-english bookmarks.

[Highmind63 (highmind63)]

Further debugging led me to this strange truth: KIS 2009 was causing all the trouble for me, I opened a bug for that bug 454693, if anyone here can confirm if they have Kaspersky AV

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

No. Kaspersky is not installed nor used in my system.

[Highmind63 (highmind63)]

Can you post which AV you do have, could be others behave similarly...

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

It's McAfee SecurityCenter v.8.1.
I also use Ad-Aware 2008.

It seems to me that the problem occurs only in Vista but not XP (see comment #17). Can you or anyone else who has the similar problem also post your OS?

[Unijoe (unijoe)]

Confirmed on XP Pro SP3.

I have Kaspersky 2009 installed (v. 8.0.0.454). I run XP Professional SP3. I have the same problem. It seems like it happens once, the first time after clicking "bookmarks" after opening firefox. It only seems to happen if you CLICK on the menu (versus clicking on Tools and sliding the mouse to the left).

[spinstartshere (spinstartshere)]

Binary package hint: firefox-3.0

When clicking File, a new window opens. When clicking Bookmarks, the page is bookmarked. The only way I can access either of these two windows is by using keyboard shortcuts or by selecting another menu and then mousing over to them.

Using Ubuntu 8.04.1 and Firefox 3.0.1.

[jjos (jbenjos)]

JD Francis,

Thank you for the bug report! Can you please give step by step instructions on how to reproduce this bug?

Jonathan

[spinstartshere (spinstartshere)]

Well to be honest there's not really much more to it than starting Firefox and then clicking either File or Bookmarks to get the respective result.

[Hew (hew)]

I get this as well, but only the bookmarks part of it. I have attached a screencast of me reproducing it. I cannot always reproduce it. I was able to reproduce it many times in a row, but a while later I failed to produce it many times in a row, so there is something else going on. I've only been able to trigger the bug on the first press of the bookmarks menu for the firefox session. Happens with both metacity and compiz, so not a WM issue.

The reporter says they can reproduce this with the file menu as well. In both cases it looks like the first menu option is being selected, even though only the menu itself has been clicked.

abrowser/intrepid uptodate 3.0.3+nobinonly-0ubuntu2

[Hew (hew)]

Also a problem on Ubuntu 8.10 with Firefox 3.0.3

https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/269929

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

please bring this bug in the normalized format for further processing. Read: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/NormalizedBugFormat (and maybe https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MozillaTeam/Bugs/TriagersHandbook)

[Hew (hew)]

Description updated, thanks for the links Alexander.

[Hew (hew)]

Found this thing upstream, added bug watch.

[Mak77 (mak77)]

IIRC i've read around the issue is valid for all menus, if the menu is slow to open the first item is selected. I guess it's more visible on bookmarks menu because it can be much slower than other ones.

[Tobbi-bugs (tobbi-bugs)]

(In reply to comment #27)
> IIRC i've read around the issue is valid for all menus, if the menu is slow to
> open the first item is selected. I guess it's more visible on bookmarks menu
> because it can be much slower than other ones.

So, what do we do with all the other bug reports related to this? For example these:
Bug 406646
Bug 438719
Bug 443917 (reported by me)

Shall we dupe them or change their status to NEW or what?

[Mak77 (mak77)]

*** Bug 443917 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

[Mak77 (mak77)]

so we are left with this and bug 406646, this has title referring to the thing happening sometimes, while bug 406646 is referring the specific app startup case.

i think the startup case is a special case where the thing is more visible, most likely they are the same issue.

[Tobbi-bugs (tobbi-bugs)]

More (possible) dupes:
Bug 436695
Bug 446397
Bug 369246

There might be even more!

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

I agree that they're the same thing. The problem seems to happen when the Bookmarks menu is clicked for the first time regardless of how long Firefox has been run. Note though that once the Bookmarks menu has been clicked at least once, subsequent clicks work normally and do not slow down.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

To correct my comment #15 in this post, this problem still occurs even when I have all the English bookmarks, although it doesn't occur every time I use Firefox.

[spinstartshere (spinstartshere)]

(In reply to comment #32)
> I agree that they're the same thing. The problem seems to happen when the
> Bookmarks menu is clicked for the first time regardless of how long Firefox has
> been run. Note though that once the Bookmarks menu has been clicked at least
> once, subsequent clicks work normally and do not slow down.

Not in my case. I click the Bookmarks menu, the page is bookmarked. Want to add a tag? Try and open the menu again. And I have a new back button in the form of the History menu; I can click it several times and each time the previous web page comes up.

[Mak77 (mak77)]

(In reply to comment #31)
> More (possible) dupes:
> Bug 436695
> Bug 446397
> Bug 369246

last two appear unrelated

[Donald Broatch (donaldbroatch)]

I have observed the same bug. Clicking Bookmarks brings up the Page Bookmarked dialogue occasionally instead of the drop-down menu. In addition, I've seen the 'Edit Bookmark' dialogue appear. Clicking History has also resulted in going one page back (which is the first item in the drop-down menu which should have appeared).

[aaronyyz (aaronxav-deactivatedaccount)]

I also observe the same behaviour as described above. Always affects the Bookmarks menu when opening Firefox 3.0, but I have also observed the same problem with the File menu (opens "New window" instead of expanding the File menu).

[Donald Broatch (donaldbroatch)]

I've also noticed some strange right-click behaviour: the Adblock dialogue has appeared unexpectedly several times. This is the final menu item when right-clicking an image.

[Jonathan (jalexander-saberlogic)]

I have also noticed this problem, it seems very random but once it happens it happens several times in a row for me. And after it does it once on a page its better until I visit another page and then it does it again.

I've noticed the Bookmarks and History both doing it. It even is doing it for this site right now when I click on History.

[AlNik (aleksandarsnikolic)]

I have been having the same problem for a month or so. I use Win XP, have KAV installed (but only start it once a month to scan for viruses, so I doubt it's a factor). I really have no clue what's going on.

[MadsRH (madsrh)]

+1

I can confirm this bug!

[Hew (hew)]

Please do not add further +1 or confirmation comments. This bug has already been triaged and is known upstream. If you wish to say "me too", you can use the "affects me" feature at the top of the page. Thanks.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Somebody suggested in Launchpad at https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/269929 that the long names of the bookmarks in the root folder may be the problem. I could confirm this, as when I shorten all root bookmarks, the problem disappears for me. If at least one root bookmark still has a long name, the problem still persists. Can anyone confirm this too?

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

(In reply to comment #36)
>
I gave 10 bookmarks in the root menu extremely, (page-)long names, but the bug didn't show up. Tested on Windows XP, latest trunk.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

(In reply to comment #37)
Can you tell us if you use Windows XP with SP3? (Sorry I'm not sure if by "latest trunk" you meant for Windows XP or Firefox.)

As I previously commented some time ago, I also ran Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 with Windows XP SP3 and Firefox (currently 3.0.4) and the problem doesn't exist even if I use the same copy of bookmarks (with long root bookmarks). Somebody else said that they experienced this problem with XP SP3. If you use older versions of XP and don't have a problem, it is possible that the problem comes from certain UI components in the OS (I'm guessing here).

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

Trunk builds are the test builds for the coming new release, Firefox 3.1, also called Minefield.
They can be downloaded here: http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/firefox/nightly/latest-mozilla-central/
I'm using XP SP 3 but I think it has nothing to do with the service pack because the problem is also reproduced on other operating systems.

[AstroMb (matthieu-bachschmidt)]

Hi,

The issue disappear when I rename the bookmarks on the root of the folder. The names must be short otherwise you have de problem.
Can someone confirm that .

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Great observation. I'm using Firefox 3.0.4 under Windows Vista (NOT Ubuntu), but the solution seems to work for me. Once the names of all root bookmarks are shortened, I don't see the problem anymore. If only some of the root bookmarks are shortened but some still have long names, then the problem still exists.

[Mak77 (mak77)]

*** Bug 467415 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

I take it back. The problem now resurfaces in my system even though all root bookmarks are very short. But the frequency of occurrences is noticeably lower since I shortened the root bookmarks' names.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

the right master bug is bug 187313

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

Let me point out to someone who added Bug 454693 to the dependency list that I don't have Kaspersky and never installed it but I still experience this problem. As I said in previous posts, I use McAfee SecurityCenter and Lavasoft Ad-Aware. So I think the dependency to Bug 454693 shouldn't be there. If in your case Kaspersky is a necessary component for the bug, this may be caused by a different mechanism and you may want to open another bug.

[Mak77 (mak77)]

*** Bug 469560 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

[Highmind63 (highmind63)]

*** Bug 469693 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

[Quixote7 (quixote7)]

I have the same problem, slightly different behavior. This is in FF 3.1b2 (was also in 3.1b1), running on Ubuntu 8.04. Navigation Toolbar, no Bookmarks Toolbar. No foreign language bookmarks. However, I do have dozens of bookmarks in numerous nested sets. My bookmarks file is over 1.5MB.

In my case, the dropdown menu usually appears when I first open FF. However, if a site uses lots of flash or javascript, or if I open several tabs in quick succession, then the problem usually appears. Instead of the expected dropdown menu after clicking on "Bookmarks," the first choice -- popup window to "Bookmark this Page" -- appears instead.

Alt-B from the keyboard will always produce the dropdown menu, but this is still a very annoying behavior. I hope it can be fixed soon!

[Ria-klaassen (ria-klaassen)]

(In reply to comment #7)
> I saw this history window problem for the first time when Bug 422528 was
> reported. The cause of Bug 422528 was Bug 419544.

OK, maybe I saw this then for the first time, but it was probably accidental.
The real regression range for the history menu is http://bonsai.mozilla.org/cvsquery.cgi?module=PhoenixTinderbox&date=explicit&mindate=2008-01-14+00%3A00&maxdate=2008-01-15+00%3A00 and this may not be surprising for it contains Bug 405638 which moves "Show all History" to the top of the list. For some reason it does not open the first history item in the list instead.
It remains a mystery.

[Nawanan (nawanan)]

I was experimenting something when I found out a new observation this time. I opened the Firefox window twice, and when I clicked the Bookmarks menu of the second window that appeared later, the menu behaved normally. Then I closed the second window and went back to the first window. Clicking its Bookmarks menu activates this bug again. In the past when I opened just one window, if the problem appeared (which was not 100% of the time), it was always the first time after the start of Firefox, i.e. the problem never appeared as the second or third time the menu was activated. This suggests that if the bug occurs (again, not 100% of the time), it will occur the first time the Bookmarks menu of "a specific thread" of the process is activated, with no relation to whether the menu in other threads have already been activated (assuming that I understand it correctly that two windows are separate threads). Though I'm not sure if this would help identifying the cause.

[Mak77 (mak77)]

finally merging all "bookmarks menu opens first item" bugs to bug 406646, cause is really likely the same for all of these issues, so no need to have multiple bugs to cover that.

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 406646 ***

[Mark Harper (markolalana)]

The bookmarks.html in the root folder didn't contain the bookmarks listed in my menu, I exported a new bookmarks.html through "organise bookmarks" to the root folder and replaced the existing one. Fixed it for me.

[Gervase Markham (gerv-mozilla)]

Bug 451915 - move Firefox/Places bugs to Firefox/Bookmarks and History. Remove all bugspam from this move by filtering for the string "places-to-b-and-h".

In Thunderbird 3.0b, you do that as follows:
Tools | Message Filters
Make sure the correct account is selected. Click "New"
Conditions: Body contains places-to-b-and-h
Change the action to "Delete Message".
Select "Manually Run" from the dropdown at the top.
Click OK.

Select the filter in the list, make sure "Inbox" is selected at the bottom, and click "Run Now". This should delete all the bugspam. You can then delete the filter.

Gerv