keyboard navigation in message faulty

[joehill]

In the Dapper version of Thunderbird, keyboard navigation in the "compose" window is broken. If you press the up or down arrows, it takes you to the beginning (or on occasion the end--it's not consistent) of the previous/next line.

Past versions have always worked like every other program with text fields: the arrow keys moved the cursor to the position directly above or below the current position.

[Zug-treno (zug-treno)]

Maybe related to Firefox bug 325155?

[Andy-price-ntlworld (andy-price-ntlworld)]

I'm seeing this in Thunderbird version 1.5 (20060309) under an up-to-date i386 Ubuntu 6.04 (test) install. Up and down arrow keys make the cursor go back to column 1 on the previous and next lines (respectively) instead of staying in the same column.

[Viktor-takacs (viktor-takacs)]

I also have found that in my version the arrow keys do not work in composer text area at all. In spite the arrows work in the address and subject fields.

OS info:
Linux vltakacs 2.6.12-9-686 #1 Mon Oct 10 13:25:32 BST 2005 i686 GNU/Linux

Client info:
Thunderbird version 3 alpha 1 (20060310)

Regards,
Viktor L. Takacs

[joehill (joseph-hill)]

In the Dapper version of Thunderbird, keyboard navigation in the "compose" window is broken. If you press the up or down arrows, it takes you to the beginning (or on occasion the end--it's not consistent) of the previous/next line.

Past versions have always worked like every other program with text fields: the arrow keys moved the cursor to the position directly above or below the current position.

[Dean Sas (dsas)]

This happens to me too using 1.5-0ubuntu6

It seems that if you're closer to the left hand side the cursor goes up, and on the right it goes down.

[joehill (joseph-hill)]

Do you mean that if you're closer to the right side it goes to the end of the previous/next line, and if you're closer to the left side it goes to the beginning? If so, I find that this is usually the case, but not always. Sometimes when I'm moving up, the cursor jumps from the end to the beginning of the line, and sometimes it seems random which side it goes to.

[Dean Sas (dsas)]

To be honest I didn't test it for an extended period of time but yes that's the way it seemed to work for me.

[Max-barry (max-barry)]

Up-down cursor movement problems in Compose appear widespread on Linux distributions. There's a thread about it in the Gentoo forums:

http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=3397038

... and a Red Hat bug:

http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=177436

So it's probably safe to call this one "confirmed."

[Karol Bryd (karolbe)]

The same thing happens now in Edgy version of Thunderbird. From what I know this is because of faulty libpango, however someone with appropriate knowledge should confirm it.

Any chance to fix it soon? Editing mails with Thunderbird is now...well, rather not comfortable.
I tried to rebuild it from sources but no luck, and original Thunderbird doesn't see my mail inboxes!!!

[Karol Bryd (karolbe)]

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=335810

Here is the same bug reported for Mozilla Firefox.

[joehill (joseph-hill)]

It's fixed in the new alpha version of Thunderbird (which doesn't crash in Edgy as the current one does).

[Dean Sas (dsas)]

bug 67828 says it still happens in edgy using version 1.5.0.7

[David Jennings (mail-davidjennings)]

I can confirm that turning off pango by setting MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 in /etc/environment fixes this issue.

The version is:

$ ldd mozilla-thunderbird-bin | grep pango
        libpangocairo-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpangocairo-1.0.so.0
        libpango-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpango-1.0.so.0
        libpangoft2-1.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/libpangoft2-1.0.so.0

There is a patch to fix this from RedHat: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=198759

[YoHell (joel-hedlund)]

I can confirm that turning off pango as described above also fixes the issue for me.

My system:
Ubuntu Dapper
Thunderbird version 1.5.0.7 (20060922) (dapper latest)
Linux xxx 2.6.15-27-686 #1 SMP PREEMPT Sat Sep 16 02:13:27 UTC 2006 i686 GNU/Linux

[kko (kko)]

Confirmed with v. 1.5.0.9, and also confirmed the workaround, i.e. starting with "MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 mozilla-thunderbird" removes the problem.

I added a reference to t-bird bugzilla, and judging by that report they're not aware of the patch or the workaround - anyone with a Mozilla Bugzilla ID(zilla:-) could do them and us a favor and mention this report and the Red Hat report/patch in there.

[David Jennings (mail-davidjennings)]

Also seen in Ubuntu 6.10: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/mozilla-thunderbird/+bug/38758

It's connected to the Pango library. Disabling Pango is a workaround:

$ MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 mozilla-thunderbird

or set MOZ_DISABLE_PANGO=1 in /etc/environment

There is a patch to fix this from RedHat: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=198759

[Karol Bryd (karolbe)]

Feisty is to be released soon and there is still no fixed package in the repository...(bug is still present in 1.5.0.9-ubuntu1)

[Freddy Martinez (freddymartinez9)]

Team, how are we dealing with this in regards to upstream?

[Freddy Martinez (freddymartinez9)]

Can we include 1.5.0.10 in Feisty? Main has been frozen, however we my have to include it in the -security repo.

[Karol Bryd (karolbe)]

Unfortunately bug is still present in 1.5.0.10 which just landed in the repository....:(

Does it mean that not the Thunderbird is broken but my configuration?

[David Jennings (mail-davidjennings)]

It appears not to have been fixed in the upstream Mozilla build. See https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=325480

[Hilario J. Montoliu (hjmf) (hmontoliu)]

Assigned to Mozilla Team

[Dusaint (dusaint)]

Hi,
this issue was identified almost two years ago with version 1.5 and yet still occurs now even in version 2.0.0.9 (latest version I've tried). Is a fix for this in the works? Is there any reason this is still unconfirmed? I personally have seen this on every Thunderbird version since 1.5 and on at least a dozen different Linux distributions. Thanks,

--Jon

[Psfales (psfales)]

For the record, the fix described in comment #5 has been working for us. It would be nice to get this into the official code base.

[Philringnalda (philringnalda)]

I presume that since the patch that someone forgot to upstream is against a file that no longer exists on the trunk, that this now works on the trunk, and is 1.8-only?

[Dusaint (dusaint)]

This does not work in any version of Thunderbird after 1.5 up to and including 2.0.0.9 (the version I'm currently using).

[Jesper Larsen (knorr)]

Hi Joe. Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. You reported this bug a while ago and there hasn't been any activity in it recently. We were wondering is this still an issue for you? Can you try with latest Ubuntu release (currently Thunderbird 2.0.0.16)? Thanks in advance.

[kko (kko)]

Seems fixed with Hardy / 2.0.0.16. At least my t-bird doesn't need to be started with the work-around any more, though I'd like for others to confirm this as well. (The upstream report states the bug was present with 2.0.0.9 still.)

[David Jennings (mail-davidjennings)]

I can confirm kko's comment. With Thunderbird 2.0.0.16 I no longer require the work-around. Key navigation appears to be correct now.

[Jesper Larsen (knorr)]

Redundant confirmations on this issue being solved in 2.0.0.16. Closing bug and reporting status upstream.
Thanks for confirming.

[Jesper Larsen (knorr)]

This bug seems fixed in the latest version 2.0.0.16.
Got 3 confirmations (including my own) in Ubuntu bugtacker: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/mozilla-thunderbird/+bug/38758

[Psfales (psfales)]

I'm still seeing the bug in 2.0.0.16. (We've been privately building in the patch mentioned in comment 5, and that's been working for us. But when I remove that patch and build again, I see the problem. Is it possible that Ubuntu has pulled this fix into their version?)

[Jesper Larsen (knorr)]

Yeah seems like it. I downloaded the source from the repositories, and there's a patch.

I've added it as an attachment.

[Jesper Larsen (knorr)]

Created attachment 335983
Patch in Ubuntu to fix

[Psfales (psfales)]

Yes, that looks exactly like the patch that was in comment 5.

It seems like there is pretty strong agreement both that the problem exists, and that this is a reasonable fix. If it's in the official Ubuntu release, it's been seen by quite a few "eyeballs." Here's hoping that someone can get this bug out of the unconfirmed state and put the patch into the official source!!

[Zack Weinberg (zackw)]

The code that was patched by that patch no longer exists in current versions of the core code, and I am unable to reproduce the problem with thunderbird 3.1.16 nor firefox 8.0.