Double-clicking Firefox launcher produces "Firefox is already running" error
Affects | Status | Importance | Assigned to | Milestone | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mozilla Firefox |
Confirmed
|
Unknown
|
|||
firefox-3.0 (Ubuntu) |
Confirmed
|
Undecided
|
Unassigned |
Bug Description
Binary package hint: firefox
Firefox 3.0.9, Ubuntu 9.04
Canonical has started user testing of Ubuntu and its applications. During our first test, one test subject double-clicked on the Firefox launcher in the panel. She managed to do this at exactly the right/wrong speed, producing a "Close Firefox" error alert: "Firefox is already running, but is not responding. To open a new window, you must first close the existing Firefox process, or restart your system."
I have been unable to reproduce this error from the launcher, but it is reproducible from the terminal. Steps to reproduce:
1. In a terminal window, enter "firefox & firefox".
What happens:
* A Firefox window appears.
* A "Close Firefox" error alert appears.
What should happen:
* Two Firefox windows should appear.
* No error alert should appear.
Changed in firefox: | |
status: | Unknown → New |
Changed in firefox-3.0 (Ubuntu): | |
status: | New → Confirmed |
Changed in firefox: | |
status: | Unknown → Confirmed |
Changed in firefox: | |
importance: | Unknown → Low |
Changed in firefox: | |
importance: | Unknown → Critical |
status: | Unknown → Confirmed |
Changed in firefox: | |
importance: | Critical → Unknown |
There have been a lot of reports on this lately, it's not clear if there is a single cause or multiple causes. We could really use some QA help to take this seriously and track these issues down.
Once it happens you can't relaunch Firefox without finding the process and killing it -- a procedure that novice users are not going to manage. No doubt there are a lot of bugs something like "Firefox won't open anymore until I reboot".
Notice that there is a new Mozillazine article for this (bug 399392): kb.mozillazine. org/Firefox. exe_always_ open
http://
Not sure if I should have just reuused the meta bug 239223 -- that's pretty old and seemed to be privacy/security related. We should take a closer look at the bugs listed there as well.