Message text is selected on click (in HTML emails)

[Julien Olivier]

[Impact]
Affects any selection of text inside iframe blocks; in any package depending on gtkhtml (evolution, xiphos)

** there is another possible issue with selection inside <frame> blocks, though this is not addresses in this bug report nor in the patch provided, being a separate issue. **

[Development Fix]
A small fix was identified upstream in GtkHTML code, a patch is provided in the upstream bug report. That patch was packaged in Quantal as gtkhtml4.0 4.2.2-1ubuntu2.

[Stable Fix]
The gtkhtml4.0 package 4.2.2-1ubuntu2 is applicable directly on precise with no changes, and contains only this bug's fix as changes from the version available in Precise.

[Test Case]
1) Open Evolution
2) Select an email that shows in HTML (or rich text, with bolds, fonts, etc.)
3) Attempt to select text.

[Regression Potential]
The piece of code being changed affects scrolling sizes and selection ranges; possible regressions would likely affect scrolling behavior and selection in other applications depending on GtkHtml. This is expected to be low risk since few applications depend on the library, the current behavior being already provably incorrect, with a very small and focused patch.

----

Since very recently, whenever I left-click on a character inside a message's text, all the text from the top to the said character gets selected. Actually it behaves like if I hold the "shift" key while clicking.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: evolution 3.2.3-0ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-18.28-generic-pae 3.2.9
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-18-generic-pae i686
ApportVersion: 1.94.1-0ubuntu2
Architecture: i386
Date: Sun Mar 11 16:19:49 2012
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release i386 (20100816.1)
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=fr:en
 TERM=xterm
 LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: evolution
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to precise on 2011-09-23 (170 days ago)

[Julien Olivier (julo)]

Forget the last sentence, pressing "shift" doesn't normally do that on texts.

[Julien Olivier (julo)]

I have noticed today that it only happens on HTML emails. If I set my preference to only display messages as raw text, the bug is gone.

[Julien Olivier (julo)]

Bug #713663 seems like the same bug as this one, but I don't know which one to mark as duplicate.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Paul (i41bktob-launchpad-net)]

Julien: that bug is a year old, whereas this one just started now for us and others (bugs 953248 and 954775 are true duplicates of this bug).

[Paul (i41bktob-launchpad-net)]

Marked bug 953248 and bug 954775 as duplicates of this bug.

[Paul (i41bktob-launchpad-net)]

Marked bug 954723 as a duplicate of this bug.

[Sebastian (szm)]

Marked Bug #961337 as a duplicate of this bug.

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. The issue you are reporting is an upstream one and it would be nice if somebody having it could send the bug to the developers of the software by following the instructions at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Bugs/Upstream/GNOME. If you have done so, please tell us the number of the upstream bug (or the link), so we can add a bugwatch that will inform us about its status. Thanks in advance.

[Frederik Elwert (frederik-elwert)]

Seems to be a GTKHTML issue rather than evolution (see upstream bug)

[Fabian (fabian-markus)]

Also affects 64bit installation 12.04 ubuntu

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package gtkhtml4.0 - 4.2.2-1ubuntu2

---------------
gtkhtml4.0 (4.2.2-1ubuntu2) quantal; urgency=low

  * debian/patches/gtkhtml_fix-iframe-selection.patch: fix selection inside an
    iframe tag; use the right GdkWindow object to retrieve widget allocation
    and to be able to select text properly. (LP: #952307)
 -- Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre <email address hidden> Wed, 02 May 2012 20:49:54 -0400

[Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre (cyphermox)]

Uploaded the fix to precise-proposed, awaiting approval by the SRU team.

[Clint Byrum (clint-fewbar)]

Hello Julien, or anyone else affected,

Accepted gtkhtml4.0 into precise-proposed. The package will build now and be available in a few hours. Please test and give feedback here. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Thank you in advance!

[Michał Sawicz (saviq)]

I can confirm that fixes the issue in my case.

[Julien Olivier (julo)]

Hello Clint, this is fixed for me now. Thanks a lot to all involved!

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package gtkhtml4.0 - 4.2.2-1ubuntu1.1

---------------
gtkhtml4.0 (4.2.2-1ubuntu1.1) precise-proposed; urgency=low

  * debian/patches/gtkhtml_fix-iframe-selection.patch: fix selection inside an
    iframe tag; use the right GdkWindow object to retrieve widget allocation
    and to be able to select text properly. (LP: #952307)
 -- Mathieu Trudel-Lapierre <email address hidden> Wed, 02 May 2012 20:49:54 -0400