Fenix: [Bug] No preview when swiping between tabs

[SinTan1729]

Steps to reproduce

1. Open at least two tabs
2. Swipe between them

Expected behavior

Some kind of preview should be there while swiping.

Actual behavior

No preview. Just a black placeholder until the swiping gesture is released.

Device information

• Android device: Redmi K20 (Android 10)
• Fenix version: Nightly 200723 06:01

[person808]

Are these tabs you have just opened or tabs you have already visited before? To put it another way, when you open the tab tray, do these tabs have thumbnails or are they non-existent/blank? Currently we capture thumbnails on page load, so if you opened a new tab but you haven't actually viewed the page yet there is no thumbnail available. There is some thumbnail related work in GeckoView that would help us capture thumbnails more often (https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/12859#issuecomment-663122149).

I suppose there is an argument to be made that we should show a placeholder if the thumbnail isn't available.

[jonalmeida]

@person808 this definitely sounds like the same issue that #12859 suffers from as well. A temporary black background might suffice as a default for now.

[SinTan1729]

@person808 I have visited those before and they do have thumbnails showing up in the tab switcher. Although another bug is that some pag s don't show thumbnails at all (e.g. twitter).

[ghost]

@person808 Perhaps this https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/12642, #9904 are related. The transition between tabs gives a flash. May be that's why we we are not getting previews correctly.

[Neikon]

I have not preview too.
Oneplus 7
Android 10
Firefox nightly build of 24/07/2020
a little video to show how it looks @person808
https://youtu.be/7zJn2nij2Ns

Note: twitter preview is blank in tab tray too

[person808]

For twitter, it looks like the thumbnail we get is of the site's splash screen which is why the thumbnail appears blank. I tried reproducing @Neikon's video since it looks like the duckduckgo preview isn't showing when it should, but the preview shows for me. It could be possible that the thumbnail was deleted after loading mozilla.org, we don't see the tab tray after so I'm not sure.

[Neikon]

I can record as many videos as you need @person808 . But swiping I never can see a thumbnail. https://youtu.be/_FvM6bA5atQ

In other hand, I hadn't noticed that duckduck's thumbnail sometimes disappears from the tab tray as well (it's not only duck, it's whatever web). I think It disappears when come to firefox after open another app but i can not reproduced when i want. I tried many times and I could record the bug in this video https://youtu.be/nRjnmP7q7zg
But in this other video https://youtu.be/5gHaERELg2s i do the same and It resist. I see sometimes it disappear when i go to android homescreen, stop the record , come back firefox.

I tried to open many apps to force android to close firefox, and thumbnails seems resist. the web reload but thumbnail is there.
Tell me if you need something more

Oneplus 7 (8GB RAM)
Android 10
Firefox nightly build of 03/08/2020

[person808]

Thank you @Neikon! The videos are helpful. From video 1, it appears that something is up with the preview. If we see thumbnails in the tab tray, we should be able to load the preview for the gesture, but that is clearly not working. I'll keep an eye out and see if I can eventually reproduce this. Maybe @jonalmeida can take a look at the videos too and see if theres anything I'm missing?

[jonalmeida]

Unfortunately, this issue is similar to the others reported that are related to thumbnails where the root cause is this GV bug: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1647797

For tracking, this is the root A-C bug that will land after the GV fix lands: https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/android-components/issues/7413

[bifleming]

Looks like both the GV bug and AC bug have been closed...

[Neikon]

in today build does not work yet, but the twitter preview in the tab tray works now, it is improving but not complete.
https://youtu.be/hUUImKS0owI
NOTE: build number in video

[jonalmeida]

Thanks for the video, that's quite helpful!

@person808 I'm no longer certain this is a thumbnail issue. In the video above, we can see that we have the thumbnail when switching tabs from the tabs tray, so the gesture navigation should be able to those thumbnails.

[person808]

Hm I can't seem to reproduce at all. All TabPreview does is call loadIntoView so my best guess is that is failing somehow. Twitter still takes a screenshot of the spash screen so I opened the tab tray to force a screenshot and the preview loaded fine for me on my Pixel 2 XL

[AndiAJ]

Hi, verified as fixed on the latest Nightly Build 200826 using the following devices:
• Google Pixel 3a (Android 10)
• Huawei Mate 20 Lite (Android 10)
• OnePlus A3 (Android 6.0.1)

► Video

[Neikon]

It still doesn't work for me, Should i do something?
https://youtu.be/9CU_vmNK_2k
Oneplus 7, android 10

[SinTan1729]

It's still happening for me. On the 200826 build.
Here's a screen recording.

[AndiAJ]

In this case I'll re-open it.
@SinTan1729 what device are you using? ☺️

[SinTan1729]

I'm using a Redmi K20 (Android 10).

[abodea]

Hi, verified as fixed on the latest Nightly Build 200904 using the following devices:
• Google Pixel 4 XL (Android 11)
• Samsung Galaxy S10+ (Android 10)

@SinTan1729 can you please re-check this on the latest Nightly version?
Removing eng:qa:needed until further notice, if @SinTan1729 cannot reproduce this issue, I will close it.

[SinTan1729]

Unfortunately, it's still happening for me.
Redmi K20 (Android 10)
Screen recording.

[Neikon]

it doesn't work yet
https://youtu.be/pghtYfjeBwM
Oneplus 7, android 10

[AndiAJ]

Reproducible on the latest Nightly Build 200907 using a Google Pixel 3a (Android 10) while in landscape view.

[jonalmeida]

Reproducible on the latest Nightly Build 200907 using a Google Pixel 3a (Android 10) while in landscape view.

Oh hey, that's a cool find! When I rotate the phone into landscape and back the bug is easily reproducibly on my Pixel 4 with Nightly 200908 06:01.

[boek]

@jonalmeida any idea what could be causing this or who should I talk to about debugging it? :)

[jonalmeida]

@boek I think this related to the swipe gesture layout. As AndiAJ noticed, the swipe gesture doesn't see to be able to load the thumbnail after rotating the phone, so I wonder if it's because of some conflict in the dimensions the swipe gesture layout desires (in landscape) from the thumbnail which is a portrait.

After rotating back to portrait, I was still able to see the issue, so there might also be some cache invalidation there needed as well.