Comment 131 for bug 66566

(In reply to alexander.kern from comment #123)
> Hey all, I think opening a new tab in background in a fast way/without
> leaving the current page is very useful. I had an extension for that but
> it's no longer possible because webext API does not offer that possibility.

Not from the URL bar, but extensions can definitely open background tabs, so an add-on could still do this using a page/browser action or a sidebar to offer you UI.

> That's why I'm following this bug closely. However now I'm surprised. Here
> are all the things that happen on Firefox nightly 64.0a1 (2018-09-06)
> (64-Bit):
>
> ctrl: add www..com
> ctrl shift: www.com (should be add www..com in new window?)
> shift: new window foreground
> alt: new tab foreground
> alt ctrl: add www..com and open in new tab foreground
> alt shift: nothing happens, should be default action in tab background or
> new window background?
> alt shift ctrl: www.com new tab background
>
> The name/description of this bug is "Inconsistent "open in new tab"
> shortcuts (Ctrl+Enter for links, but Alt+Enter in address bar and search
> bar)"
>
> So I think the changes now are useful, but do they solve the original issue?
> Ctrl+Enter still doesn't open a new tab in background, like it does
> everywhere else. I suggest:
>
> ctrl: open in new tab in background

This behavior is now possible, but it's behind a pref (about:config, browser.urlbar.ctrlCanonizesURLs), because the outcome of some of the (long) discussion here was that to remain consistent with Chrome and IE/Edge, we would continue to keep that as the default (see e.g. comment #93). Note that AFAIK Chrome uses `ctrl-enter` even on Linux and Mac, so per the spreadsheet in comment #103 ( https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VVEVjyIYRZIFteM71j5bJhENa2xXT82gaikr0WgpKLA/edit#gid=0 ) the default there is also to use ctrl-enter. (This is a change on mac, where it used to be cmd-enter.)

I'll change the summary to more accurately reflect what was changed here.