Bug 607756

Summary:	Firefox window not given focus after clicking links in other applications
Product:	Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5	Reporter:	Philip Durbin <pdurbin>
Component:	firefox	Assignee:	Martin Stransky <stransky>
Status:	CLOSED WORKSFORME	QA Contact:	desktop-bugs <desktop-bugs>
Severity:	medium	Docs Contact:
Priority:	low
Version:	5.5	CC:	dsavage, philipdurbin, stransky
Target Milestone:	rc	Keywords:	Triaged
Target Release:	---
Hardware:	x86_64
OS:	Linux
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version:		Doc Type:	Bug Fix
Doc Text:		Story Points:	---
Clone Of:		Environment:
Last Closed:	2012-07-26 12:17:47 UTC	Type:	---
Regression:	---	Mount Type:	---
Documentation:	---	CRM:
Verified Versions:		Category:	---
oVirt Team:	---	RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team:	---	Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description Philip Durbin 2010-06-24 18:03:48 UTC

Description of problem:

Before the update to Firefox 3.6.4, when I clicked links in Thunderbird, gnome-terminal, and other applications, Firefox would be raised to become the topmost window, given focus, and go the to URL I had clicked.  Now, the Firefox window is not raised or given focus.

Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable):

firefox-3.6.4-8.el5

How reproducible:

Always

Steps to Reproduce:

1. Default install from rhel-server-5.5-x86_64-dvd.iso
2. rhn_register
3. yum -y update
4. Launch firefox
5. Launch gnome-terminal, echo "http://www.google.com"
6. Right click over http://www.google.com and click "Open link"
  
Actual results:

The Firefox window, which is behind the gnome-terminal window, goes to http://www.google.com but is not raised to become the top window or given focus.  Instead, in the taskbar (the bottom gnome-panel), the Firefox button flashes blue.

Expected results:

The Firefox window should be raised to become the top window, given focus, and go to http://www.google.com.

Additional info:

Only tested on x86_64

Comment 1 Matěj Cepl 2010-06-25 22:30:49 UTC

Could you please go to about:config (don't worry about the warning, I don't ask you to change anything) and tell me the value of browser.tabs.loadDivertedInBackground variable and whether it is in its default value (it is bold if changed), please?

Could you also attach output of the command

grep -H browser.tabs ~/.mozilla/firefox/*/prefs.js

please?

Thank you

Comment 2 Philip Durbin 2010-06-28 13:26:40 UTC

browser.tabs.loadDivertedInBackground is set to false, the default.

There is no output:

[pdurbin@rhel5 ~]$ grep -H browser.tabs ~/.mozilla/firefox/*/prefs.js
[pdurbin@rhel5 ~]$ 

I'd be curious to know if you can reproduce the problem.  For me it was easy with a default install and a "yum -y update".  Thanks for looking into this, Matej.

Comment 3 Matěj Cepl 2010-07-19 21:39:37 UTC

I can reproduce this easily and settings of various browser.tabs.*Background* variables doesn't seem to have any effect on it.

Comment 5 Robert G. 'Doc' Savage 2010-07-20 14:56:54 UTC

Before this problem appeared, clicking on a link in an Evo e-mail produced a flashing Firefox tab on the toolbar. This indicated a new tab was opening in Firefox, even though the browser itself was either minimized (in the current workspace) or open (in another workspace). Now that link is still opening in Firefox, but there's no longer any flashing indication in the toolbar. It *appears* as though clicking on the link in Evo does nothing, even though it actually *does* work. You just have to *know* to switch to Firefox. The previous behavior -- a flashing Firefox tab on the toolbar -- is really needed.

The state of browser.tabs.loadDivertedInBackground does not seem to matter.

Comment 6 Philip Durbin 2010-07-21 13:29:07 UTC

I just upgraded to firefox-3.6.7-2.el5 and the problem persists: the Firefox window is not given focus after clicking links in other applications.

Comment 7 Martin Stransky 2012-07-26 12:17:47 UTC

Works for me. Please reopen if you still see it.