Firefox 2.0 - net accessed when bookmark properties viewed

[Allan Mondor]

Just noticed that Firefox 2.0 accesses the net every time the properties
of a bookmark are viewed. It appears Firefox 2.0 is downloading the page
referenced in the bookmark behind the scenes. This is not good as it
causes unnecessary network traffic.

As far as I can tell this is a change in behavior from 1.5 and there
doesn't seem to be any way to disable it.

Does anyone know how to disable these network accesses?

Thanks,
Allan

www.allancharlesmondor.ca

[Nir]

do you have any live bookmarks ?

[Allan Mondor]

Nir said the following on 11/7/2006 3:28 PM:

no

[Chris Ilias]

_Allan Mondor_ spoke thusly on 07/11/2006 5:25 PM:

Perhaps it's looking for live titles.

[follow-up set to mozilla.support.firefox]
--
Chris Ilias
mozilla.test.multimedia moderator
Mozilla links <http://ilias.ca>
(Please do not email me tech support questions)

[Allan Mondor]

Myk Melez said the following on 11/7/2006 4:56 PM:

> Chris Ilias wrote:
>> _Allan Mondor_ spoke thusly on 07/11/2006 5:25 PM:
>>> Just noticed that Firefox 2.0 accesses the net every time the properties
>>> of a bookmark are viewed. It appears Firefox 2.0 is downloading the page
>>> referenced in the bookmark behind the scenes. This is not good as it
>>> causes unnecessary network traffic.
>>>
>>> As far as I can tell this is a change in behavior from 1.5 and there
>>> doesn't seem to be any way to disable it.
>>>
>>> Does anyone know how to disable these network accesses?
>>
>> Perhaps it's looking for live titles.
>

> Yes, that's what Firefox is looking for, and no, there isn't a way to
> disable the behavior. Note, however, that Firefox only downloads the
> page's HTML content and CSS stylesheets. It doesn't download JavaScript
> scripts or images. So the amount of network traffic it generates is
> generally quite small (probably ~5-10K, on average).
>
> -myk

That is very disappointing to here. Was this change meant to be an
improvement?

Allan

www.allancharlesmondor.ca

[Myk Melez]

Allan Mondor wrote:
> Myk Melez said the following on 11/7/2006 4:56 PM:

>> Yes, that's what Firefox is looking for, and no, there isn't a way to
>> disable the behavior. Note, however, that Firefox only downloads the
>> page's HTML content and CSS stylesheets. It doesn't download
>> JavaScript scripts or images. So the amount of network traffic it
>> generates is generally quite small (probably ~5-10K, on average).
>>
>> -myk
>
> That is very disappointing to here. Was this change meant to be an
> improvement?

Yes. The purpose of Firefox downloading the page is to see if it
provides a microsummary, in which case Firefox lets the user select the
microsummary as the live title for the bookmark.

-myk

[Allan Mondor]

Myk Melez said the following on 11/7/2006 7:46 PM:

I for one sure do not care for this feature and I would really like to
see way to disable it.

Many web sites out there have long or annoying titles that simply just
clutter up my bookmarks, so the last thing in the world I want is for
Firefox to even attempt to down that stuff. This is especially true
when I'm just viewing a bookmark's properties.

On a related note, Firefox, gives you no way to know the URL behind a
bookmark when you use it through the Bookmarks Toolbar or the Bookmarks
Sidebar (it doesn't show up in the status bar nor as balloon help as is
done in IE). So I often resort to viewing a bookmark's properties to
decide if it's the site I want to revisit or not and as such I think it
is very bad for Firefox to automatically access the site without my
consent.

You know, if one didn't know better, this 'feature' could be viewed as a
attempt to artificially inflate web usage stats in favor of Firefox :-)

Allan

www.allancharlesmondor.ca