Closed
Bug 175436
Opened 22 years ago
Closed 20 years ago
Error, failure of key downloads
Categories
(SeaMonkey :: Download & File Handling, defect)
Tracking
(Not tracked)
RESOLVED
WORKSFORME
People
(Reporter: jon.roland, Assigned: bugzilla)
References
Details
When attempt to download some files, such as .exe and .gif, Download Manager appends a .ext to the file name, will only download to c:\windows\temp directory. At apparent end of download, get message: <filename.txt> could not be opened, because an unknown error occurred. Sorry about that. Try saving to disk first and then opening the file. The file does not appear in c:\windows\temp, and was not downloaded. The problem is not specific to any particular URL. Does not occur with some kinds of files, such as .zip. Sometimes, instead of downloading the file with its own name, it tries to download with the URL of the page as the filename, typlically with a .htm[l] extension. I am having to use IE Explorer or an earlier version of Netscape to download files. I would prefer that Mozilla function the same way they do, allowing the user to select the download directory, change the filename, and that it not attempt to open the file after downloading. I would also prefer an option of NOT downloading supporting files of an HTML file, putting them in a <filename>_files directory, and changing links in the main file. I want to download files just as they are, changing nothing.
Comment 1•22 years ago
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Reporter: This might be Bug 171441, please look it it (and dupe then or not).
Reporter | ||
Comment 3•22 years ago
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Not a dupe of 171441, which occurs at the beginning of a download, whereas this error 175436 occurs at the end. Tried renaming compreg.dat but no joy. Problem can be demonstrated by trying to download bouvier1.exe at http://www.constitution.org/cs_refer.htm Build version is 1.1.0.2002082611
Comment 4•22 years ago
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www.constitution.org sends bouvier1.exe with Content-Type: application/octet-stream This bug is dupe of 120327 which is fixed in recent builds. *** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of 120327 ***
Status: UNCONFIRMED → RESOLVED
Closed: 22 years ago
Resolution: --- → DUPLICATE
Comment 5•22 years ago
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Reopening. This has nothing to do with bug 120327 because here the file CANNOT BE SAVED AT ALL. Which is a very major difference. Please be a little more careful when marking bugs duplicate, ok? Jon, for the last part of your opening comment, just change the "file type" selector in the filepicker from "web page, complete" to "web page, html only". That preference will stick, of course. Now back to the main problem. Are there any particular urls that you can point me to that fail every single time? Those would help immensely in debugging this....
Status: RESOLVED → UNCONFIRMED
Resolution: DUPLICATE → ---
Comment 6•22 years ago
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Sorry, I cannot distinguish this bug from the bug 120327 since http://www.constitution.org/bouv/bouvier1.exe WFM on build 2002102512. It DOES NOT append any extension. It DOES download the file without any problems.
Reporter | ||
Comment 7•22 years ago
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A URL for this this problem is exhibited is http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com from which I was unable to download updates and security patches, which are .exe files. Had to use Netscape or IE. But any URL with a link to a .exe file will do. Can't download any of them. Same problem with .gif files (!). Download Manager insists on adding .txt, then at the end of the download, fails with the "Could not open" message and no file left (in the c:\windows\temp directory, where I don't want it anyway, as space on the C: drive is precious and not sufficient for some files I might want to download (therefore the use of external media -- sometimes including CD-R disks, to protect against self-modifying executables).
Reporter | ||
Comment 8•22 years ago
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I should add that the application associated with .txt files on my Win98 SE system is UltraEdit, not Notepad, and it can open binaries for editing. Also, Mozilla build 2002082611 is not installed on the C: drive, but on the E: drive, as I do not install anything on the C: drive if I can avoid it. Also, I normally only download files to a removable disk. I am not working with 1.2 beta to have a stable product, so it is possible a later build will have fixed the problem, but if so I would like to know which one it is.
Comment 9•22 years ago
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Jon, could you please give me precise steps on where to go from http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com and what links to click on to reproduce this? Another question... what do your helper app preferences say for .exe files and for the type application/octet-stream? Let's leave the c:\temp thing alone; that is a totally separate issue, ok?
Reporter | ||
Comment 10•22 years ago
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Precise steps at http://windowsupdate.microsoft.com ? Click on any of the windows upgrades. Or any .exe file on at page anywhere. Have never been able to download an .exe file from anywhere. Have tried more than a dozen sites. I just provided an example of a self-extracting executable on one of my sites in the original post. Helper app preferences are blank for .exe files and for the type application/octet-stream. I absolutely don't want newly opened executables to be opened immediately upon being saved to disk. Run them through virus checkers first.
Reporter | ||
Comment 11•22 years ago
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Oops! I went into Edit | Preferences | Navigator Helper Preferences, selected application/octet-stream and Edit, changed the default option to "Save to disk" and "Ask before opening ...". Now downloading works. I have to change the name to remove the .txt extention Mozilla tried to append, but I can select the target directory. Problem was user ignorance, but it could be considered a bug in the way the default settings are done. Suggest the defaults should be "Save to disk" and "Always ask" (which should be greyed if no application to open is selected). Thanks for your help. Visit our site at http://www.constitution.org for some good material.
Comment 12•22 years ago
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What were the settings before you changed them (when things were not working)? (As a note, there are no default settings at all in that panel; anything that's set you set at some point, possibly without knowing it).
Reporter | ||
Comment 13•22 years ago
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There are default settings in that panel, which shows an .exe file as "Text", because you can only toggle between "Save to disk" or "Application", and the default setting was "Application", but no application was selected (and Mozilla apparently doesn't pick up the Windows associations). There us also an option for "Ask me before opening..." which was set. Apparently, with "Application" selected but without an application chosen, the download fails with an error message that does not prompt the user to edit application/octet-stream to select the application. I would say this qualified as a bug, because settings should not cause operational failures unless there is an error message that explains what to do to fix it. There is no file type entry for "Executable" or ".exe", which might be a way to set up Mozilla to handle .exe downloads without appending a .txt extension, if it could overload the appending for application/octet-stream. FYI, I have posted a couple of messages to netscape.public.mozilla.wishlist that have some suggested enhancements that might be of interest, based in part on Z-Mail, which is no longer supported, but which has some good features that should be incorporated in Mozilla. --Jon
Comment 14•22 years ago
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OK. Setting summary to something reasonable.... For the record, the way to reproduce is: 1) Set application/octet-stream to have the .txt extension 2) Select "view with application" 3) Set it to have no helper 4) Leave "ask me" checked 5) Click on a link to a file of type application/octet-stream that is not an EXE. 6) In the helper app dialog that comes up, select an app you want to use and uncheck the "ask me" checkbox. Is that correct? If you repeat those steps do you see the bug?
Reporter | ||
Comment 15•22 years ago
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Interesting. I am now unable to reproduce the bug by returning the settings to what I originally found them to be: "Application" with no application selected. Now when I try to download an .exe file, I get a window that prompts me with the option of "Open using an application" or "Save this file to disk", set to the latter, and "Always ask before opening this type of file" set, regardless of whether I set "Always ask ..." in the edit window for application/octet-stream. If I select OK I get a second window with "Enter name of file to save to" which allows me to change the file name and directory. If in the first window I select "Open using an application", the OK button is greyed until I select an application. However, if I change the name of the file to remove the appended .txt, and select "All files" (*.*), it comes back trying to append .txt to the name, whereas if I just remove the .txt but leave it at "Save as type" (.txt), it opens the Download Manager and saves successfully without the .txt extension. I didn't get those two windows before I edited the application/octet-stream entry. Mozilla just went directly to open the Download Manager window, tried to download, and just at the end gave the message "Unable to open" and aborted the download. I conclude that editing the first time created a record that was missing during the initial installation, and that the missing record created the problem. Now if I can just solve the problem of Mozilla failing to load any Java applets, even though the plug-in screen shows Java 1.4 installed, I will have solved my two most pressing problems. (I reported this in bug #92782.)
Reporter | ||
Comment 16•22 years ago
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I should add that if I just let Download Manager save the file without removing the .txt extension it does so successfully with that name, which confirms my theory that the original bug was the absence of a record for application/octet-stream upon initial installation.
Comment 17•22 years ago
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The original bug was a malformed record caused by a bug in the helper app dialog, almost certainly.
Depends on: 86640
Reporter | ||
Comment 18•22 years ago
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I don't think the bug is in the helper app dialog itself, because I had never seen that dialog before the problem appeared or visited the edit window for the helper app. My theory is that the bug is in the initial setup/installation. Once I visited the edit window of the helper app, the problem got fixed. I also observed the same bug in a new installation of build 2002082606 on an XP machine, installed a few days previously.
Comment 19•22 years ago
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The helper app dialog is the one that asks "do you want to save this or run it"? The default installation (if it's a Mozilla.org build) does not include any MIME configuration at all, and certainly no MIME misconfiguration. We just make it easy to create. ;)
Reporter | ||
Comment 20•22 years ago
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Yes, and originally I never saw that dialog window. I right clicked on the link and selected "Save link target as ..." and the Download Manager was immediate invoked, skipping the "Open/Save" and "Save as" windows. Right-clicking on the link and selecting "Save as" now invokes the "Save as" window, skipping the Open/Save window. Clearly there has been a persistent state change which is some kind of record. It might be instructive to know where that record is, and whether it can be viewed or edited, to examine its state immediately following installation.
Comment 21•22 years ago
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Well, the MIME data is stored in a file called mimeTypes.rdf in the profile directory. The file called prefs.js also contains preferences for "never ask me again".
Updated•20 years ago
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Product: Browser → Seamonkey
Comment 23•20 years ago
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Old version bug, no response. This should work, otherwise we had a lot of dupes for that. Resolving.
Status: UNCONFIRMED → RESOLVED
Closed: 22 years ago → 20 years ago
Resolution: --- → WORKSFORME
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Description
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