firefox 2.10 freezing gutsy

[shanen (Shannon Jacobs)]

Binary package hint: firefox

There have been lots of problems ever since I upgraded to Gutsy, but since installing the 2.0.0.10 version things have gotten significantly worse. I'd be glad to provide some diagnostic information, but I don't know where to look, and I haven't been able to detect the patterns that are triggering the problem. I suspect it's involved with switching from one window to another, since focus problems started with the Gutsy upgrade. The current form is a hard freeze of all of the Firefox windows. None of them can update, but other applications can be run without apparent problems. I'm not sure if the problem is with Firefox per se, or with the underlying windowing system, because usually Firefox is the only application with multiple windows at the time of the crashes, and I'm pretty well convinced the problem involves lost focus in the process of changing windows--but I don't know how to pin it more concretely.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Sat Dec 1 16:14:40 2007
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 7.10
Package: firefox 2.0.0.10+2nobinonly-0ubuntu1.7.10.1
PackageArchitecture: i386
SourcePackage: firefox
Uname: Linux shanen-WA70L 2.6.22-14-generic #1 SMP Sun Oct 14 23:05:12 GMT 2007 i686 GNU/Linux

[shanen (Shannon Jacobs) (shanen)]

Just clicked on a link to open a new window from Firefox, and again got a crash, but the nastier one--the white screen of death. From that state there's nothing to be done but cut the power and reboot.

I went ahead and switched back to the restricted driver after that crash, and I've rebooted again so it has effect, so I'll start watching and waiting for the next time. So far I haven't been able to link it to any particular website or activity, but I'm wondering if it could be a problem with the plugins? Something triggering them in a background window?

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

Please try to disable your extensions.

to disable all temporarily you can start firefox from the command line in safe mode:

  firefox -safe-mode

 - Alexander

[shanen (Shannon Jacobs) (shanen)]

Thank you for your comment and polite suggestion, but that doesn't seem to be a very plausible diagnostic step. If I had some step to reproduce the problem, then it would be useful, since I could try it both days, but as a just "wait and see" step, it seems useless. The lack of anything happening would prove nothing, and I would have to hope for the luck of something happening (since a crash would be the case proving the disabled extensions were not the cause). I use two of the extensions quite heavily, and if I have to be severely inconvenienced, then I might as well go back to Windows and wait for the Ubuntu people to get their act together.

I am willing to run a certain number of diagnostic tests, especially including tests that might make the problem reproducible (and therefore fixable). I am willing to search the logs for evidence if someone will give me some hints about what to search for. However, I am not willing to work as a random beta tester. If the software isn't ready for real use, then I'm sorry, but I have some things I really want to do.

I will say that I have not seen any recurrence of the Firefox-only crash that I reported in this bug. However, just this morning I have seen two recurrences of a more serious crash, the white screen of death, which might possibly be related to it. I hadn't seen any of them for quite a while, so now I'm pretty worried again. The white screen of death is a total lockup of the system, not just Firefox, and requires a total power down and reboot...

[Saša Bodiroža (jazzva)]

Hello shanen,

Are you still expiriencing this bug with the latest Firefox 2?

[bencollier (bmcollier)]

Hi,

I'm getting something very similar to this, first with GG, now with HH. Using Firefox, suddenly focus gets stuck in particular layer of the screen, and it takes significant effort to access the other layers. Sometimes right-clicking works, although it's very erratic and I have no way of reproducing this reliably.

If firefox can be closed, the problem goes away, although it reappears pretty quickly if Firefox is relaunched.

Any ideas? The problem seems to be something to do with the way that Firefox treats individual areas of focus on the screen.

[Alexander Sack (asac)]

On Wed, May 07, 2008 at 01:24:20PM -0000, bencollier wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm getting something very similar to this, first with GG, now with HH.
> Using Firefox, suddenly focus gets stuck in particular layer of the
> screen, and it takes significant effort to access the other layers.
> Sometimes right-clicking works, although it's very erratic and I have no
> way of reproducing this reliably.
>
> If firefox can be closed, the problem goes away, although it reappears
> pretty quickly if Firefox is relaunched.
>
> Any ideas? The problem seems to be something to do with the way that
> Firefox treats individual areas of focus on the screen.
>

Maybe disable extensions one by one until your problems are gone?

Anyway, given that you cannot reliably reproduce this doesn't appear
to be something we can process. Thus,

 status invalid

Thanks,

 - Alexander