Closed Bug 126826 (back/forward) Opened 23 years ago Closed 22 years ago

'Back' and 'Forward' buttons not working because of "invalid" max_entries in prefs.js

Categories

(Core :: XUL, defect)

Product:
Core
Component:
XUL
Type:
defect
Priority:
Not set
Severity:
major

Tracking

()

Status:
VERIFIED FIXED
Milestone:
mozilla1.3final

People

(Reporter: mariner77, Assigned: jag+mozilla)

References

(
URL
)

Details

(Keywords: regression, Whiteboard: [adt2])

Attachments

(4 files)

screenshot of right-clicking on greyed-out back button
53.33 KB, image/jpeg
Details
forward button, with empty session history
53.04 KB, image/jpeg
Details
go menu, with Back incorrectly greyed-out (current page viewed is most recent in session history)
64.09 KB, image/jpeg
Details
Ignore value in prefs.js, always go with default (specified in all.js)
1.25 KB, patch
jrgmorrison
: review+
bryner
: superreview+
asa
: approval1.3+
Details | Diff | Splinter Review
From Bugzilla Helper: User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; PPC Mac OS X; en-US; rv:0.9.8+) Gecko/20020220 BuildID: 2002022008 Both 'Back' and 'Forward' buttons are grayed out, not working. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. Open any webpage and try clicking 'Back'. 2. 3. Actual Results: nothing happens, buttons non responsive Expected Results: Expect them to function. Mac OS 10.1.2
WFM.
I don't know what to say then, it just doesn't work for me. Are we using the same OS?
Mac OS X 10.1.3, tested with 2002022008 and 2002022016, mozilla-macosX-trunk.smi.bin. Can you test some older builds and see if they still work or are broken also?
Ohhh!! Someone who can finally reproduce this. Donglai, we need a lot of information. To start, can you please tell me what the textbox in the "Session history" section of the History preference panel contains?
Session history is set to 1. Just for the record, I'm now running build 2002022016. The two buttons still don't work.
That is the problem. We need to better understand why max session history is set to 1. That would cause the back/fwd buttons to always be enabled, because the "1" would always be the page you're looking at. Donglai: does it work if you use a new profile?
PA: I have ran older builds up to 10/19/02 and they did not have this problem.
I can't try a new profile because the profile manager crashes as soon as I open it. :-(
Blake, I understand what you are saying. Setting Session History to more than one will obviously make the Back button come alive; however, for will anyone (or any website) be able to view my session history? The reason I set it to 1 is to protect my privacy.
Session history is never saved on the desk. It is all in-memory. While in memory session history can be accessed through the javascript's window.location.history object. This JS object only allows simple operations like history.back(), history.forward(). To actually peruse through a window's session history through the back door, the script would need special privileges. These privileges ought to be granted by the user before a malicious script can access them.
Donglai seems to be the only person encountering this problem (he was its' reporter). WFM using RC1.
URL: http://any
Donglai, can you still reproduce this problem using a current build?
Marking this as blocking the various other bugs filed on this lately, and confirming so someone checks it out. There is _some_ problem here (installer? session history? XUL?), and creating a new profile is _not_ the right answer.
Blocks: 131584, 141236, 141290, 143662, 144360
Status: UNCONFIRMED → NEW
Ever confirmed: true
I just ran into this issue with build 2002051708 on Win2k (sp2sr1). I'm not sure all of what I did to trigger the issue, but I browsed a few sites yesterday in the following order: 1. http://www.mozillazine.org/ - read a couple articles - manually typed then followed links 2. http://www.oqo.com/ - this is a flash site. I clicked around for a while reading a number or things. - manually typed then followed links 3. http://www.transmeta.com/ - followed links to various products using the Transmeta chip. Ended up at the NEC server - left the browser up overnight and continued below the next day (today) - manually typed then followed links 4. http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/attdg/ - followed links about it... - manually typed, then followed links That was where things got weird. When I started clicking "Back", the forward button stayed gray, the screen would go to the previous page, but the URL bar always stayed on the oreilly site no matter how far back I went. Jake
bug 140565 looks a lot like what I just described here. Jake
I can reproduce it everytime. Back and Forward buttons and menus are ALWAYS disabled. Started happening with Mozilla RC2 on Win2k SP2 256 mb ram. Installed mozilla build 2002051708, no change. Buttons as well Go->Back/Forward are always disabled. I can't check preferences because the tree in the prefrences dialog seems to be disabled. I can't expand any nodes. Also all select boxes are disabled. I am not sure if these are related. I can't file new defects using mozilla because I can't make any selections in the query form. The os for this bug should be changed to ALL since this seems to be a cross- plaform issue.
Moiz: bug 135017 is (sort of) the bug for why you can't manipulate the preferences dialog, etc. This isn't on topic for this bug really, but exactly how did you install RC2. With a brand-new directory or over top of an existing installation (and which one exactly)? Did you use the "stub" installer (the ~200KB initial EXE that manages the download) or the "blob" installer (has "sea" in the filename) or just by unzipping the zip file, or ...
Everyone who experience this bug should try setting their session history bigger than 1 (if you can) and see if the bug still persist. I suspect not. If that's the case then this is not really a bug, rather a issue of how 'Back' is implemented. The way it seems to work in Mozilla is that you need to have more than one page cached in session history in order to go back...not exactly how I'd implement it but that's not up to me.
*** Bug 141290 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Keywords: nsbeta1
nsbeta1+/ADT1, due to large number of dups and end user feedback.
Keywords: nsbeta1 → mozilla1.0.1, nsbeta1+
Whiteboard: [adt1 rtm]
Target Milestone: --- → mozilla1.0.1
*** Bug 148737 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Platform -> ALL OS -> ALL see comment 14 and comment 16 and various bugs wich are marked as dups of this one..
..forgot to change the values.. ups ;)
OS: MacOS X → All
Hardware: Macintosh → All
*** Bug 149135 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 112282 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
To comment on a thread from bug 112282: I think Evelyn has a profile that exhibits this behavior.
Mozilla Mozilla 1.0 Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.0.0) Gecko/20020530, installed over a 0.9.9 version, and I have this problem. Disappointing for 1.0. )-8
*** Bug 149732 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 150261 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 131584 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 150366 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Can we get an ETA for this bug?
I have no idea if we can actually fix this bug without knowing fully what's going on. We have some ideas, and I'll take a look into them. Possible causes: 1) user sets session history pref to something less than 2. user error, though we should perhaps not allow this 2) the profile somehow gets messed up and we default to 0 instead of 50. blake has a (partial?) patch for this in another bug 3) web pages using "special" names for frames and windows (e.g. "content", "top", "title") which override properties with the same name on the content window objecct, confusing our code. Fix our code to look at the original property getters and setters instead of the user overrides.
Whiteboard: [adt1 rtm] → [adt1 rtm] [eta 06/21]
I have same situations as #16, no back/forward buttons or pref tree. Also the progress bar & throbber don't work, the only indication of activity is the mouse cursor. This began today after install of 1.0 over .99. I am now running 2002061108 & have the same problems. I recieved two error messages during inital load after install, unfortunately I didn't write them down. I'll try to reproduce and get those messages. (it seems to be attempting to use non-existant methods in a existing dll, something about unicode)
If you installed 1.0 "over" 0.99, you are almost certain to have problems. Did you uninstall 0.99 first? I don't even bother with the installer. I grab the zip builds and unzip it to a directory (after deleting the previous version, of course). After you've verified that you've corrected the above, can you try creating a new profile. There were some profile issues a while back that caused havoc when using older profiles with newer builds. Try creating a brand new profile just for testing purposes and see if you still get the same behavior. Jake
Un-installed then re-installed 2002061108. Now working fine for me. I didn't do anything to the profile (was going to as next step). Still got errors on first run, but those are apparantly not related to this bug & don't seem to be hurting anything.
*** Bug 151508 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 151603 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 145489 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 152593 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I would like to make one addition to this one because they are related to the backward and forward button. I'm using Build ID: 2002053012. I noticed that when I clicked back button once, it then load the previous page. If I want to go back 3 more pages to the previous. I would click it three time using the back button with a mouse click or with the "Alt <--" keys. It won't go back 3 pages, it go only to the previous page (1 page back). Wouldn't it make sense to just stop loading the previous page and instead just go backward to the 3rd previous page? (Not having to click each time and wait for the page to finish loading then click again, etc.) Oh by the way, I had the cache in the preference cache setting set to refresh on every time I visit the page. Thanks, FletchSOD
Can anyone who sees this problem -- of the back and forward buttons *never* enabling -- please e-mail to me their problematic profile's prefs.js and localstore.rdf?
Back/Forward buttons are always greyed out, as is the right-click menu selections in the content window. However I found two workarounds: 1. Even though you can't click the buttons, you can right click them and see the drop down menu with the history, from which you can use to go back. 2. If I right click a link to "Open Link in new Tab", then when I return to the original tab, the buttons now are available and work as expected. I had same behavior int RC3, which was installed over top of another beta without installing, (I'm sorry I don't remember which one but it was earlier than RC1), thought the 1.0 would make it go away. Also, I'm surprised I don't see more comments about this bug anywhere, that makes me think there is something that locally conflicts with my installation. (I even tried an uninstall "Add Remove Programs" then a reinstall with mozilla-win32-installer.exe (199KB) but it did not go away. Also note(since I see a similar reference below), I'm also unable to expand any '+' under preferences so I can't change any of the settings. I haven't looked up this bug yet to find out about it. Using win98 SE, 4.10.2222A
Just wanted to clarify... RC3 was installed over another beta without *UN*-Installing the beta first. (sorry for the mistake and the extra comment)
Chad, please see comment 42.
I've mailed him the two files, but it might be important to note that I first used the profile manager to successfully create a new profile, and then browsed using that profile for a while. It was the files from the new profile that I sent him. The behavior was exactly the same from the start for the new profile, including being unable to expand the '+ ' in the prefs menu. I don't know the code, but it seems as if it can be narrowed to two clicks as illustrated by the workaround I mentioned earlier: Click 1: "Open link in new Tab" Click 2: Now that focus is on the new tab, click the original tab. It suddenly works, using the history that had already been accumulated, but previously disabled from accessing with the buttons.
I didn't notice until re-reading the previous comments, but my progress bar, and the "M" in the top right (the throbber?) do not work either. I only mention it because they still don't work even after I get the buttons to function by performing the "open in tab" workaround. (I expect there is another bug regarding this, but I wanted to be complete with my symptoms incase they are related) BTW: how is this different than bug 140565 as listed in comment 15 from jake? I expect one should be listed as duplicate.
Does deleting your components.reg help?
Based on comment #47, and #43, it appears that the problem might not be failure to create or initialise session history, but because the browser fails to register itself as a nsIWebProgressListener. This would prevent getting updates to the throbber, status bar as well as the back forward buttons.
Whiteboard: [adt1 rtm] [eta 06/21] → [adt1 rtm] [eta 06/28]
*** Bug 145553 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
This appears to be unrelated to profile, and related to installation and upgrading.
*** Bug 145740 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Removing component.reg does not help. I would agree with comment 49 that it's probably not due to tracking or building the session history, because the history is definitely being accumulated. I can see the complete list from the beginning of the session by using the first workaround from comment 43: The button stays greyed, but a right-click on the back button will show the history from the beginning, just as if it were active... (which would have the same effect as a left-click on the black down arrow if it were available.) It's not the case that the workaround suddenly triggers the history into starting, which then gives the buttons something to work with. I was thinking about removing everything by hand (more thoroughly this time) and starting with another fresh install... However I don't mind using what I have and continuing to experiment if anyone thinks that there is still something to learn about my install that can be useful to locating/patching the bug. -Chad
Do the back and forward buttons in the Help viewer work, after you visit a couple help topics?
> Do the back and forward buttons in the Help viewer work, after you visit a couple help topics? No. The tree control doesn't work there either like it doesn't in the preferences. On a clean install, I think it works though.
Also what is not working: Start with www.mozilla.org - now go to http://www.derstandard.at click on a news bullet, now you are on the detail page of that news report. If you click back you should normally be at the startpage of derstandard.at but are suddenly at mozilla.org using trunk build 2002062713 on win-xp.
The problem described above in comment #56 is different from what is originally reported here. I have a bug on it. Please don't distract this bug from the original issue.
*** Bug 154795 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Downgrading to adt2 per adt.
Whiteboard: [adt1 rtm] [eta 06/28] → [adt2 rtm] [eta 06/28]
What new information do we have that makes this less severe than when it was originally prioritized?
*** Bug 155637 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I'm using: Mozilla 1.1a Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.1a) Gecko/20020611 on win2k I'm always getting the issue with 'forward' and 'back' not working the difference is, when I create a new tab, the buttons start working and show the correct history, then I can go around, but when i reach the border of history, the buttons don't get deactivated. The correct button is deactivated when I switch to another tab and back, but then it isn't activated until I switch to another tab and back one more time. I hope it can be a pointer somehow If I should report it to another bug instead please correct me
On another thought I have done as suggested and uninstalled mozilla and deleted all remaining files. Now everything seems to work all right.
*** Bug 158349 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Keywords: regression
Will fixing this also fix the problem reported in comment #56 ?
Alias: back/forward
I'm running 20020726 on Windows XP, on a Dell Latitude PIII 500 laptop. This problem has persisted for several installations of Moz, but I'm not sure how far back the problem goes. Uninstalling Moz and reinstalling the latest nightly build didn't solve the problem. The ALT <- and -> keys don't navigate either, but right-clicking on the grayed out back/forward buttons lets me navigate by page title, and holding down ALT and scrolling the mouse wheel navigates as well.
The program directory is still around after you perform an Uninstall using "Add Remove Programs" Did you delete that as well? I'm not sure what's still left in it, but it seems that you have to delete that by hand after the uninstall finishes. The same thing happened to me even with multiple installs/uninstalls as the newer builds came out, but the problem wouldn't dissappear until I manually deleted the program folder. That seemed to fix it for me.
*** Bug 160314 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I have the same problem with the Back and Forward buttons being non-functional. This is true for all Web pages. Yes, I can right-click on the back button and see the history. However, I can not tell what my session history is set to. I orginally installed version 1.1 beta, but when I went to report an earlier bug, the Bug Writing Guidelines requested that I test first with the lastes nightly build. After installing that version, I have no more "My Sidebar", which is where I assume the value is to be found since it is not under Edit/Preferences. I'm going to uninstall this version and go back to 1.1 beta and leave the bleeding edge to others.
Whiteboard: [adt2 rtm] [eta 06/28] → [adt2]
true with build 2002082008
I am having this problem as well, it started when I installed Build ID:2002082008 I now have Build ID:2002082104 and the problem still exists. I am running Windows 2000.
Bug 162593 caused missing bookmarks AND not working back and forward buttons. Maybe people with that problem will think that they ran into this bug?
I just installed 2002082008 and got both of these bugs: bookmarks no longer appear in the personal toobar or bookmarks menu (they still exist if you 'manage') AND the forward and back buttons are both greyed out and don't work on a left-click. Right-clicking works. I at first thought it was because I had the pinball theme, but neither modern or classic works for either of these issues. I originally installed on top of a previous build, then did add/remove and installed again (too late?) also, my mouse wheel gets 'stuck' in the CC: field on this page, scrolling that instead of the whole page for a while, then not working at all. going back to a previous version till this all goes away... win98, full sea installer
I just quit the browser, renamed compreg.dat and restarted the browser - now the toolbar is back, and the fwd/back buttons are back. Sounds like an install issue. build 2002082008, win98
Both comment 73 and 74 is bug 162593.
I recently updated Mozilla 1.1b to last night's build (Aug. 21) and this triggered the issue, among other problems. It was a nightmare of bugs and I uninstalled it and reinstalled Mozilla 1.0 I am running Windows XP on a Dell Dimension 8200. I had Norton Anti-Virus and Virtual CD running. Don't know what caused it but I didn't really have the time to play around with it. BTW Back button on the mouse wouldn't work ether.
I recently updated Mozilla 1.1b to last night's build (Aug. 21) and this triggered the issue, among other problems. It was a nightmare of bugs and I uninstalled it and reinstalled Mozilla 1.0 I am running Windows XP on a Dell Dimension 8200. I had Norton Anti-Virus and Virtual CD running. Don't know what caused it but I didn't really have the time to play around with it. BTW Back button on the mouse wouldn't work ether.
Oh yea that was it. All my bookmarks were visible under Bookmarks->Manage Bookmarks... but they were not directly on the Bookmarks menu. Uninstalling the latest version and reinstalling 1.0 fixed the problem.
Hey Everyone! Can you all check out these unconfirmed bugs to see if anyone of them are duplicate. Some of them also have interesting comments, see if this can help you to narrow down the problem! Thanks. See bug #162192 as reference. See bug #162567 as reference. See bug #163083 as reference. See bug #163242 as reference. See bug #163184 as reference. See bug #160255 as reference. CC'ing myself
*** Bug 164360 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Here's the comment from the recent duplicate bug, bug #164360. I found one part to be interesting, that is the "Animated Mozilla" at hte upper right corner. --clip-- The back button (and or forward) do not highlight when there is history. Clicking on them does nothing. You must right click and select from the menu. The animated mozilla busy area (M -> Head -> M ) does not animate. Stays at 'M'. No URLS appear in URL area. I'm use the grey modern chrome. --clip--
*** Bug 164301 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
When I reported this, I had installed over an older copy. Installing into a new dir 'fixed' this issue. I ran builds from 8/23 and 8/25 fine when freshly installed. Animation works as well (M->Head->M)
Marking most of the bugs I put down recently to be a duplicate of bug #162593. Reporter & everyone, take a look at bug #162593 and you decide what to do with this bug while I help out to clean up the unresolved bugs into a duplicate bug of bug #162593.
*** Bug 163083 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 163184 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 160255 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 165264 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Removing the line user_pref("browser.sessionhistory.max_entries", 1); from my prefs.js solved the problem for me...
Blocks: 165459
*** Bug 162282 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Well, we shipped with this again. I estimate that 1 in 11 7.0 problem submissions are regarding this. Per comment 89, I think we need to sanitize the session history pref on installation. Sounds like that somehow got trashed in the 6.x days.
Using 1.1 Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; de-AT; rv:1.1) Gecko/20020826 This is a new installation but the profile exists since RC2 (migrated from NS4.7). The mentioned user_pref is not set in my prefs.js. Nonetheless, the problem occurs temporarily. I just created a new profile and can't reproduce it. But as the problem occurs only sometimes this fact is not very convincing.
I have for a while now, been raising the question of a problem with the first window that opens. Of course being the first Mozilla window to open it is not immediately reproduceable. The problem is not tangeable; start pages vanish, which of course is greying out of the back button, SSL sometimes does not work, URLs do not appear, just little things. My question is; is this bug one of those things?
I have for a while now, been raising the question of a problem with the first window that opens. Of course being the first Mozilla window to open it is not immediately reproduceable. The problem is not tangeable; start pages vanish, which of course is greying out of the back button, SSL sometimes does not work, URLs do not appear, just little things. My question is; is this bug one of those things?
Back/forward also not working in pull down menu or through keyboard. May be unrelated: buttons in 'preferences' do not work or expand when clicked. Win 2000 pro. Same problem in earlier version (1.0?) so I downloaded 1.1 and problem still exists.
I am only seeing this in the OS9 versions of 1.1, not the OSX version (also occurs in 1.0 & 1.2). Setting the humber of history items is irrelevant. Interestingly, if Mozilla is run from the Classic environment in OSX, 1.0 shows the behavior, 1.1 does not.
For those having problems such as in comment 95, have you tried creating a brand new profile and running from that? I think a lot of problems have to do with some incompatibilities with older profiles. Jake
There is a known problem with installing Mozilla / Netscape into the same directory as the previous install, the solution there is to install it into a differently named directory or remove the contents of the directory before installing.
I for one have replaced my profile at least once since I noticed this problem, and I have always deleted the last installation of Mozilla before installing the new one.
Is bug 166807 in any way related to this ?
I have consistently found that my backbutton is diminushed and has no function whatsoever. What can I do to restore this capability? BTW, Mozilla loads faster than *ANY* web browser I have used in a long time. Bob Baird
Keywords: mozilla1.2
Build: 2002102508 on Windows2000 I also am have been experiencing this bug, but I have noticed the following: When I start browsing a website (ie. clicking links), the text in the address bar does not change to the current site address, and the Forward and Back buttons are grey. But, if I switch to a new tab in Multizilla, and then come back to the original tab, the text is current and the buttons are enabled. I hope this helps you solve the problem.
*** Bug 148431 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
No longer blocks: 165459
*** Bug 165459 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I also see this problem intermittently (WinXP, build 2002110610, with Multizilla installed). Usually clicking over to another Multizilla tab and back again will clear things up, and like the earlier reporters, I can right-click on the back button to get a history list. My browser.sessionhistory.max_entries is set to 50, so that's not the problem.
Reproducible test case from the Multizilla bug I just filed at http://www.mozdev.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=2459 : With one tab open, click a link or two so your Back button is enabled. Now right-click the tab bar and select "New Tab." The Back button gets greyed out correctly. Close the new tab and it doesn't get un-greyed when the browser switches back to the original tab.
i can't even right click the back buttons for history. my browsing history is set to 5, and the back/ foward buttons don't work either. nothing seems to be working. renaming the compreg.dat doesn't work, reinstalling it (and deleting the folder) doesn't work either. wat's going on here? Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.2b) Gecko/20021016
*** Bug 181431 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 176836 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Same thing with Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.2) Gecko/20021126
I was discussing bug 182529 with someone when they guessed (correctly) that it was a problem with installing Mozilla over a previous release instead of uninstalling/deleting/reinstalling. When I tried that, the symptoms of #126826 went away as well. FYI, the problem occured when overinstalling 1.2 on top of 1.0.
*** Bug 182970 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
*** Bug 177629 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Flags: blocking1.3b?
Thanks to people reporting at least three different problems here this bug report isn't at all clear. From what I can tell, the original report is that session history was manually or programatically set to 1. With this setting the back and forward buttons didn't function. Any reports of different problems should be different bugs. From what I can tell there are at least three additional reports that have many times been folded into this one. The first report is of a problem where back and forward buttons do not work but the context menus do show history. This is probably covered by all the dupes in bug 141290 which should probably not have been duped against this bug and may actually be the same problem as described next. The second group of bugs duped and commented here is bug 135017 where trees like in prefs, mailnews or bookmarks manager don't work. This may or may not be the same as the issues reported in 141290 but definitely isn't the same as the original report in this bug. The third group of report here which probably doesn't belong is back and forward not working as well as bookmarks not working and this is bug 162593. There are also two or three obviously not related "is this the same problem" posts to this bug. Without clear bugs describing specific problems we're not going to get anywhere on this.
No longer blocks: 131584, 141236, 141290, 143662, 144360
*** Bug 185908 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Had the same problem with the last build on NT4. The buttons BACK and Forwaard did not function as did the preferences panel. After un-installing an dooing a clean install the buttons did work corectly as did the preferences panel.
*** Bug 186623 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I posted a new bug that some feel is the same bug as this however I am not running a MacOS so if you want to read my bug it is http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=186623 In short I upgraded Windows 98SE (Where everything was working fine) to WIndows XP and both Mozilla 1.2.1 and Netscape 6.2 had the back/forward options greyed out. After 3 days I looked in Netscape - edit > preferences > navigator > history > Browsing History and found an option not in Mozilla: Session History. I changed this from 0 (zero) to 6 (six) and it solved the problem. Now the back/forward options all work again. I was told that this bug is a duplicate of this bug but reading this thread I do not see where the user has upgraded from Windows98SE to Windows XP or where anyone has mentioned Netscape 6.2 also having the same problems. SO I do not see that my bug is "exactly" the same as this bug. In any case, if you have Netscape 6.2 (or higher?) on your Mac try seeing if it has the same problem. Than see if changing the settings in Session History fix the problem. If so than this becomes more of a duplicate bug that is not on only one OS.
Dave, what did you do exactly with Netscape/Mozilla. You said you upgraded Win98 to WinXP. Did you re-install Netscape or Mozilla or not? Did you uninstall and re-install? Re-install in a different directory? Etc. Or did you just left the Netscape/Mozilla unchanged when you upgraded Win98 to WinXP? If Dave leave the Netscape/Mozilla unchanged then Dave's Comment #118 will serve a valuable insight into the problem. It would point out that Netscape/Mozilla's architecture are different to the varieties of Windows O/S. I'm not sure if WinXP ever rewrite the Netscape/Mozilla's software as oppose to the Netscape/Mozilla's architecture. If someone can isolate this problem, make a patch to it and check it into the trunk. This will be a great help in reducing varieties of duplicate bugs. This will help to further clarify some of the not so understanding bugs and further improve Asa Dotzler's comment, Comment #114 or otherwise alter it. I believe it is worth the shot.... Not all O/S are created equal, you know...
In case I was not clear - all seeting should have been the same. All I did was upgrade to Windows XP leaving all Netscape/IE/Mozilla folders and setting alone. Ine thing I did notice is that XP seems to keep some reg setting and delete/hide others. I have some programs that suddenly are not registered or activated even thought they were. As far as the problem at hand: prior to upgrade no problems and all worked as they should have, after upgrade Mozilla/Netscape 6.2 had not back/forward buttons or options. One other XP quirk that doesn't really have to do with Mozilla/Netscape but is worth a mention - One site I designed has a re-direct script that will send viewers to an "old" page if they use, for example, Netscape 4.xx. In windows 98 this worked fine, in XP it detects Netscape 4.xx as Netscape 6.
Windows XP, Version 2002, SP1: 1.2GHz Celeron, 256MB RAM Mozilla 1.3a - Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.3a) Gecko/20021212 (titlebar says 2002121215) I see this occasionally, but hadn't seen it much since I filed bug 112282. I had been surfing normally, and opened a new tab w/ Ctrl+T. I went to google & did a search for an RFC. When I viewed the search result that I wanted, I noticed that the back arrow was grey. :\ Details of bug: On most recent page in session history, the back arrow button is greyed and cannot be left-clicked. Right-clicking on greyed-out back button will bring up session history & clicking on an item in the history will take me to the page. [see my first attachment of screenshot] Pressing Alt+<- (left arrow) does not work (does not take me back in session history). In the Go menu, the Back option is greyed out, but the past history is there, and is selectable...also, for some reason, the forward button is NOT greyed out (though it should be) and when you click on the down arrow next to the forward button, a small square comes up (an empty session history). [see my second attachment of screenshot] Also, in the Go menu, the Forward item is incorrectly selectable, and when selected, correctly takes me nowhere. [see my third attachment of screenshot] Reverse the above, i.e. view oldest page in session history, and the forward button will be greyed-out, but right-clicking will bring up the existing session history, the back button will be incorrectly shown with an empty session, the Go menu will incorrectly show the Back option as available and the Forward option as greyed-out. Please see screenshots to see what I'm talking about, if this sounds confusing to you. I still have the browser open, and if a dev needs some more info or files to be sent it to investigate this, please let me know!
fixed
something else I noticed: if you look at attachment 110222 [details], attachment 110223 [details] & attachment 110224 [details], you'll notice that the URL incorrectly shows google, instead of the current page's URL. I forgot to mention that when I click onto another tab, and click back to the tab that the buttons/history is messed up, this bug goes away...until I click a link or go back/forward in the history, and it automagically reappears. :\ To clarify the strange behavior I'm seeing: If I am on the oldest page in the session history (of, for example, 4 pages in the history) for the messed up tab, and click onto another tab & then return to the messed up tab, I'll right-click on the forward button (which isn't greyed-out) and move forward in the history. Now, the back button is greyed-out and the forward button is working properly...the symptoms of comment 121 are in effect. Now, if I go the most recent page in the session history and then go to another tab and back, I have a working back button. I go back in history, and the forward button remains greyed-out and non-functional. Again, the symptoms of comment 121 are in effect, but the symmetry of the symptoms are reversed compared to starting at the oldest page in browser history. Confusing?! ;) Let me know if I can clarify more...
I have found that if a page has not fully loaded for any reason, and another page is loaded, the first, unloaded page sometimes no longer exists, to go back to. Has anyone also noticed this.
*** Bug 188074 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Windows XP Professional Version 2002 SP1 Mozilla 1.3a Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.3a) Gecko/20021212 maybe this will help some...I have seen the problems I described in comment 121, comment 122, comment 123, comment 124 & comment 126 when I run across bug 137477 (Some tabs cannot be closed). See comments 43, 44, 45 & 46 & 53 in 137477 to see additional information that may assist in squashing this bug... :)
Now try this for size. Start computer, click on Phoenix, sign on to ISP. Check Start Page, then working from left to right across personal bookmarks; visit Mozilla.org to see whats new, phoenix/nightly to see if I want to download. Then using the back button drop down menu return to Start Page. Before it can fully reload click Yahoo mail. I am now on Yahoo mail's sign-on page, but I have a greyed out back button, but the forward button still contains Mozilla.org, and phoenix/nightly, which I can go to and return from. Perhaps most people are fortunate enough to have broadband, but I still use a dial up, so pages load slowly, and I see these problems almost every day. Most annoying!
Really annoying bug, since i counldn't check out how it came true. Yesterday i surfed a bit in the net. Today, i noticed a grey-out-staying back- button. Same for the forward-button. Both buttons stay greyed out. No way to get them word. This also meets for the go-menu/back|forward. The histroy of the Go-Menue is always reduced to the current uri, but this is selectable. Browser: I used Moz102; then i downloaded Moz12, in the hope to remove this bug. The bug stayed, like described, unchanged. The profile also stayed, maybe there's a relation? I use W2kSp1. And, now, the most annoying: This text i typed two times; at the first time i changed the mile-stone-box of moz (to moz1.2final). The following page told me not to do this, and i should use the 'B A C K' button to retry - made me screaming. And using IE now, although i really do NOT like it at all. Bye sam
Hi again! Just tried it with a new profile, just for surfing. Buttons are working again, as they should. So, can someone point out the correct place in the profile (Folder/File/Offset/Value to insert) to make buggy profiles work again? Cool idea, isn't it? BTW: Calling old Moz102 results in a running Moz12; unable to use both?
My back and forward buttons also don't work. Using 1.3a build 2002121215 With a new profile they work This problem is also in Netscape 6.2 I managed to 'break' netscape and since I was planning on switching to Mozilla, I did it at that time. Mozilla picked up the profile from Netscape and on a clean install with the 'old profile' it was broken right from the start. I'd rather not ditch my old profile (particularly since I don't know how I broke it so it is likely to happen again). A patch or instructions on how to fix the old profile would be most useful. I can use a new profile for browsing and my old one for mail but that seems a bit weak. Still better than IE though. Any hints or plans to address the profile issue?? don
There's no traction here, so we can't hold 1.3beta for it.
Flags: blocking1.3b? → blocking1.3b-
*** Bug 188269 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Reducing the scope of this bug to the max session history count becoming 1 or 0. See bug 141290 and comment 114 for other issues. Suggested fix: make the minimum value for this pref be 5. Patch coming up.
Summary: 'Back' and 'Forward' buttons not working → 'Back' and 'Forward' buttons not working because of "invalid" max_entries in prefs.js
Target Milestone: mozilla1.0.1 → mozilla1.3final
Alternatively we could just ignore the user pref and read the value from all.js.
Attachment #114725 - Attachment description: Ignore values in prefs.js, always go with default (specified in all.js) → Ignore value in prefs.js, always go with default (specified in all.js)
Attachment #114725 - Flags: superreview?(bryner)
Attachment #114725 - Flags: review?(shliang)
Have we already removed the UI for this pref? Ignoring the value but leaving the UI is a bad idea...
the UI was removed in bug 155712, last July
Ah, ok. Just checking. ;)
Attachment #114725 - Flags: superreview?(bryner)
Attachment #114725 - Flags: superreview+
Comment on attachment 114725 [details] [diff] [review] Ignore value in prefs.js, always go with default (specified in all.js) r=jrgm, and asking for 1.3 approval. Simple change with low risk to prevent users from disabling back/forward by setting a pointless value for SH size
Attachment #114725 - Flags: review?(shliang)
Attachment #114725 - Flags: review+
Attachment #114725 - Flags: approval1.3?
Comment on attachment 114725 [details] [diff] [review] Ignore value in prefs.js, always go with default (specified in all.js) a=asa (on behalf of drivers) for checkin to 1.3.
Attachment #114725 - Flags: approval1.3? → approval1.3+
So how do I stop this useless pref appearing in about:config? Answers on a postcard please.
Checked in. Closing this bug, please see bug 141290 for other problems causing back/forward not to work.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 22 years ago
Resolution: --- → FIXED
haven't seen any reports of this elsewhere for some time, and there don't seem to be any new dupes. verified fixed.
Status: RESOLVED → VERIFIED
*** Bug 211750 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Depends on: 406160
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