Description of problem: If a user checks the "Do this automatically from now on" box when opening a downloaded file with a helper application, there is no apparent way to ever reverse that decision. The indicated action does not appear when you click "View/Edit Actions" in the Downloads preferences -- indeed, that list is always empty. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): 1.5.0.9-2.fc6 How reproducible: Always. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Start with default firefox configuration on a new Fedora Core installation (make sure user does not have a preexisting mimeTypes.rdf file). 2. Click on a link to a pdf file. 3. Select a helper application. 4. Check the "Do this automatically from now on" box. 5. Complete the download. 6. Go to Edit->Preferences, select Downloads tab, and click on View/Edit Actions. Actual results: You see an empty list, with no way to undo or reverse the selection of automatically using that helper application for pdf files. Expected results: You should see a list containing your selected helper application for pdf files, with the option to edit or remove that automatic action. Additional info: The reason is because GNOME has now deprecated all functions that return extensions for MIME types, and firefox is configured by default to hide all actions for MIME types without extensions. Firefox calls gnome_vfs_mime_get_extensions_list (in mozilla/uriloader/exthandler/unix/nsGNOMERegistry.cpp) to get the list of extensions for a MIME type. However, in current versions of GNOME that function is hardcoded to always return NULL, so all MIME types now have an empty extension list in firefox (except for ones left over in a user's mimeTypes.rdf file from running previous versions of firefox with earlier versions of GNOME). The firefox configuration by default sets the "browser.download.hide_plugins_without_extensions" preference (which applies to helper apps as well as to plugins). Therefore, all actions are hidden and the user cannot reverse or undo the action. I have attached a patch which alleviates the problem by removing the default setting of browser.download.hide_plugins_without_extensions, as well as removing the "Extensions" column from the initial view of the action list (though the user can add it back again using the column picker) and using the file type description instead of extension as the primary field. This won't solve the problem for anyone who has explicitly set browser.download.hide_plugins_without_extensions in their user preferences file, so the real solution is probably to change the code to ignore that setting. Alternatively, one could come up with an alternative method for getting a list of extensions, but presumably GNOME made a deliberate choice to remove this functionality so there is presumably a good reason for it and it is probably better to adapt firefox-for-unix to no longer rely on extensions. Of course, firefox for windows will still need them, so any patch will have to be unix-specific (or maybe even linux-specific) with appropriate #ifdef's if pushed into the upstream firefox tree. I don't know enough about firefox development to know what those #ifdefs should be, so have not attempted such a patch.
Created attachment 147376 [details] Patch to alleviate problem (applies to the FC6-patched source tree)
An upstream dupe was created here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=370386
Fedora Core 6 is no longer supported, could you please reproduce this with the updated version of the currently supported distribution (Fedora 7, 8, or Rawhide)? If this issue turns out to still be reproducible, please let us know in this bug report. If after a month's time we have not heard back from you, we will have to close this bug as CANTFIX. Setting status to NEEDINFO, and awaiting information from the reporter. [This is mass-filed message to all open Fedora Core 6 bugs related to Xorg or Gecko. If you see any other reason, why this bug shouldn't be closed, please, comment on it here.]
Since there are insufficient details provided in this report for us to investigate the issue further, and we have not received feedback to the information we have requested above, we will assume the problem was not reproducible, or has been fixed in one of the updates we have released for the reporter's distribution. Users who have experienced this problem are encouraged to upgrade to the latest update of their distribution, and if this issue turns out to still be reproducible in the latest update, please reopen this bug with additional information. Closing as INSUFFICIENT_DATA. {This is mass-closing of all obsolete bugs; if this bug was in your opinion closed by mistake, please, reopen it with additional information; thanks a lot and I am sorry for bothering you in such case.}