[SOLVED] [Xfce] firefox-esr keeps reloading previous tabs on startup

[Mike Kupfer]

Thanks to everyone for your comments.  The problem appears to be caused
by this entry in /usr/share/xfce4/helpers/firefox.desktop:

  X-XFCE-Commands=%B -remote "openURL(about:blank,new-window)";%B;

Copying that file to $HOME/.local/share/xfce4/helpers/firefox.desktop
and changing that line to

  X-XFCE-Commands=%B;

makes the problem go away.

Bug #779330 looks relevant.

For those who are curious, here are some additional notes on how I
tracked it down:

Running

  $ strace -f -o ~/Desktop/exo-open.trace exo-open --launch WebBrowser

showed a reference to the firefox.desktop file mentioned above.  This
line seemed suspicious:

  X-XFCE-Commands=%B -remote "openURL(about:blank,new-window)";%B;

And doing

  firefox -remote "openURL(about:blank,new-window)"

from the shell would fail.

A quick web search failed to tell me what "%B" does, so I changed the
line to

  X-XFCE-Commands=%B;%B;

That made the problem go away.

The strace output also showed that the

  firefox -remote "openURL(about:blank,new-window)"

process was failing (exit(1)), and then a second attempt was made to start
firefox, but without the '-remote "openURL(about:blank,new-window)"'.
That one succeeds.  So I guess the failure of the first process is what
triggers the crash recovery behavior.

It then occurred to me to check my Stretch system, and it did not have
the problem.  Its firefox.desktop has

  X-XFCE-Commands=%B;

so that's what I'm now using.

cheers,
mike

Re: [Xfce] firefox-esr keeps reloading previous tabs on startup

[Curt]

On 2016-06-24, Mike Kupfer  wrote:
> Is anyone else on Jessie (x86_64) seeing a problem where Firefox
> (45.2.0esr-1~deb8u1) wants to reload the tabs from the previous session,
> even when the preferences are set not to do that?

I'm reading (in order to wield the biggest hammer to squash the "bug")
that you can 'about:config':

and set

browser.sessionstore.resume_from_crash

to false.

> I normally use "show a blank page" on startup, but I was getting either
> the previous tabs or the "this is embarassing" screen (where FF tells me
> it was unable to restore the tabs).
>
> I changed to "show my home page", and I would briefly see my home page
> before it was replaced by the "this is embarassing" screen.
>
> The problem isn't 100% reproducible, but it's close to it.
>
> I only have one extension (NoScript).  Disabling it didn't help.
>
> I have a few plug-ins installed, but they are all set to Never
> Activate.
>

***
> The problem seems tied to using exo-open.  I see the problem when I
> start Firefox via the "Web browser" entry in the main Xfce menu.  I
> don't see the problem if I invoke Firefox from the shell, Alt-F2, or a
> customer launcher (which just runs "firefox").
>
***

This seems like a clue someone with more mental acuity than myself might
be able to exploit.

There's only one firefox on your machine, correct?


-- 
Hypertext--or should I say the ideology of hypertext?--is ultrademocratic and
so entirely in harmony with the demagogic appeals to cultural democracy that
accompany (and distract one’s attention from) the ever-tightening grip of 
plutocratic capitalism. - Susan Sontag

Re: [Xfce] firefox-esr keeps reloading previous tabs on startup

[deloptes]

Mike Kupfer wrote:

> Is anyone else on Jessie (x86_64) seeing a problem where Firefox
> (45.2.0esr-1~deb8u1) wants to reload the tabs from the previous session,
> even when the preferences are set not to do that?
> 
> I normally use "show a blank page" on startup, but I was getting either
> the previous tabs or the "this is embarassing" screen (where FF tells me
> it was unable to restore the tabs).
> 
> I changed to "show my home page", and I would briefly see my home page
> before it was replaced by the "this is embarassing" screen.
> 
> The problem isn't 100% reproducible, but it's close to it.
> 
> I only have one extension (NoScript).  Disabling it didn't help.
> 
> I have a few plug-ins installed, but they are all set to Never
> Activate.
> 
> The problem seems tied to using exo-open.  I see the problem when I
> start Firefox via the "Web browser" entry in the main Xfce menu.  I
> don't see the problem if I invoke Firefox from the shell, Alt-F2, or a
> customer launcher (which just runs "firefox").
> 
> Any ideas?
> 
> thanks,
> mike

In my case it was a nfs issue. There was some .nfs file.

regards

Re: [Xfce] firefox-esr keeps reloading previous tabs on startup

[The Wanderer]

On 2016-06-23 at 21:26, Mike Kupfer wrote:

> Is anyone else on Jessie (x86_64) seeing a problem where Firefox 
> (45.2.0esr-1~deb8u1) wants to reload the tabs from the previous
> session, even when the preferences are set not to do that?
> 
> I normally use "show a blank page" on startup, but I was getting
> either the previous tabs or the "this is embarassing" screen (where
> FF tells me it was unable to restore the tabs).
> 
> I changed to "show my home page", and I would briefly see my home
> page before it was replaced by the "this is embarassing" screen.
> 
> The problem isn't 100% reproducible, but it's close to it.
> 
> I only have one extension (NoScript).  Disabling it didn't help.
> 
> I have a few plug-ins installed, but they are all set to Never
> Activate.
> 
> The problem seems tied to using exo-open.  I see the problem when I
> start Firefox via the "Web browser" entry in the main Xfce menu.  I
> don't see the problem if I invoke Firefox from the shell, Alt-F2, or
> a customer launcher (which just runs "firefox").
> 
> Any ideas?

Sounds like Firefox is thinking it crashed when it was last closed, and
so is automatically trying to restore the session which was running
before the crash.

I'd think there should be a way to prevent this auto-restore, but given
the settings you've said you already have in place, I don't know what it
would be. A bit of quick Googling suggests that the advanced preference
browser.sessionstore.resume_from_crash may control the behavior, but I
can't say for certain.

Why Firefox is crashing (or closing in a way which it thinks is a crash)
is another question. I often see a duplicate "browsing session" and
"crashed session" in my session-history list, so the problem may be
happening here as well - but since I _want_ Firefox to restore tabs (and
have it set to prompt me for which session to restore, via an add-on for
the purpose), I've never had cause to dig into it.

I too launch Firefox (or rather, Iceweasel; I'm still on 38ESR, and have
seen my probably-the-same-issue symptom since at least 31ESR if not
24ESR) from a window-manager menu, although I run Enlightenment DR16
(locally built, since I keep not getting back to my effort to package it
for Debian again) rather than Xfce. Once upon a time I did habitually
launch it from a terminal window, but that was years ago, and I don't
know whether the problem happened back then.

-- 
   The Wanderer

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all
progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw



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[Xfce] firefox-esr keeps reloading previous tabs on startup

[Mike Kupfer]

Is anyone else on Jessie (x86_64) seeing a problem where Firefox
(45.2.0esr-1~deb8u1) wants to reload the tabs from the previous session,
even when the preferences are set not to do that?

I normally use "show a blank page" on startup, but I was getting either
the previous tabs or the "this is embarassing" screen (where FF tells me
it was unable to restore the tabs).

I changed to "show my home page", and I would briefly see my home page
before it was replaced by the "this is embarassing" screen.

The problem isn't 100% reproducible, but it's close to it.

I only have one extension (NoScript).  Disabling it didn't help.

I have a few plug-ins installed, but they are all set to Never
Activate.

The problem seems tied to using exo-open.  I see the problem when I
start Firefox via the "Web browser" entry in the main Xfce menu.  I
don't see the problem if I invoke Firefox from the shell, Alt-F2, or a
customer launcher (which just runs "firefox").

Any ideas?

thanks,
mike