I think I have encountered a bug with Firefox that I would like to report. If there is a better place to send bug reports, please let me know!
I have OpenSuSE 13.1 with the KDE window manager. I often have a Firefox window or two open when I shut down - I love that Firefox saves my place, so I can jump right back into whatever I was working on. Unfortunately, this doesn’t work well with the current software stack. My laptop relies on a wireless network connection, which is never available immediately when I log into the KDE window manager - first, I have to enter my KDE wallet password so that Network Manager can connect to my wireless router.
So it’s not a surprise to me that all of my firefox pages load with an error ( could not connect to the internet ). When Firefox is launched, my laptop is still waiting for the internet connection to be established. Here’s the part that’s strange: even after my wireless connection is established, the “Try again” button still doesn’t work. In fact, all web browsing through Firefox continues to fail until I restart the application. Then, it immediately begins working without a hitch.
I found a workaround that is pretty easy for me (just kill firefox after the wireless connects, and relaunch it - all the pages will reload successfully this time), but I’m curious where to send this bug report to help improve the experience for less savvy users.
Probably Firefox does not pickup the change in network connection state, and therefore doesn’t even try to reconnect because it thinks you are still offline anyway. You could regard this as bug in Firefox I suppose, yes.
What I would do in your case is mark your wireless connection as “system connection”. It would be established during boot then already, so you would already be online when Firefox is started.
It would also prevent you from having to enter the kwallet password at login, and give you internet connection even in textmode.
Another hint: you can set an empty password for the wallet. You won’t be asked for a password then any more when an application tries to open it.
I have a similar problem with my laptop (connected by cable, wi-fi disabled), after every zupper up/dup and after reboot Firefox doesn’t work. Other networked functions work. I have learn to reboot again and its ok.
I have the the same software on my stat PC and have never had the problem with Firefox there as above. I had a problem sometimes when it wake up from sleep. Then its enought to restart Firefox and History->Restore Previus Session.
On the other hand after zypper up/dup there and maybe half the time my 12-year old wireless Logitech mouse need a reboot to start working again. I convinced that my house is build upon a old pet cemetery ;).
Solid advice, thanks. Making the wireless network a system connection gets the network online before Firefox launches. It’s great.
I did a little more testing, and it doesn’t look like it was set to browse offline, but the behavior was inconsistent - I don’t get this issue reliably enough to merit further reporting. Thanks for the tip.
Although this is posted in 2014, I find it very helpful. I am using Tumbleweed with almost always the latest snapshot. And I am experiencing the same situation as described here.
This advice seems helpful to me as well. But I do not know how to make the wireless network a system connection. Could anyone help to describe it more clearly?
I need to delete the old one then add it again to make it work for ‘All users may connect to this network’. Or else the system would ask for password for root to connect after boot, because “System policy prevents modification of network settings for all users”.
When creating the new connection, I should select the password saving option (the disk icon on the left of the password input field) to “Store password and make it available for all users (not encrypted)”.
This only happens if the connection is established during login as before, and seems to be a “bug” (or design flaw) in NetworkManager itself.
You do need the root password to modify a system connection (“modification of network settings for all users”), but this shouldn’t be needed to activate it. And actually it will be activated if you just click on Cancel in the root password request…
If the password is stored system-wide (as you do in point 2), the connection is established during boot already (and that’s what I actually suggested as fix/workaround).
Btw, I may have misunderstood you, but you seem to have two connections now, right?
You do not need to keep the old connection if you create a new one.
OTOH, you would not need to create a new one at all, you can just change the existing one in the first place.
Btw, back in 2014, this was still called “system connection” in the settings (in KDE at least). This has changed some time ago (in 13.2, which was released in November 2014) to be in line with newer NetworkManager (and GNOME) versions.
When creating the new connection, I should select the password saving option (the disk icon on the left of the password input field) to “Store password and make it available for all users (not encrypted)”.
Yes, current plasma-nm versions still store the password per user even when “Allow other users to connect” is activated (just like GNOME does).
Previously, it was always stored system-wide (“make it available for all users”) in that case, that’s why I didn’t mention it here in this thread two years ago.
Do you mean that one need only the 2nd point in my post to make a connection “system connection”? Or to say that I do not really need the 1st point?
Yes, you’re right. And I figured it out later
Ah Haaa, that’s very interesting. Earlier this morning, someone told me that in Ubuntu, the password of wifi is stored system wide. But why we changed it? It is because storing it system-wide makes it unable to encrypt it?
No, you do need both.
Enabling “Allow all users to connect” will make it a “system connection” (as it was called years ago).
But the connection can only be established during boot (i.e. before the user logs in) if the password is stored system-wide, not in the user’s wallet (which can only be accessed once the user is in fact logged in).
I mainly wanted to point out that you do not need to create a new connection, you can modify the existing one.
Ah Haaa, that’s very interesting. Earlier this morning, someone told me that in Ubuntu, the password of wifi is stored system wide. But why we changed it? It is because storing it system-wide makes it unable to encrypt it?
“We” didn’t change it.
The NetworkManager developers did, and the KDE developers adapted.
But yes, the likely reason is that it will be stored unencrypted if it is stored system-wide (though at least in openSUSE only root will be able to read it).
Btw, it should be the same in Ubuntu (in recent versions at least).
Depends on the front end as well though, i.e. in this case the version of plasma-nm.
