Switched to tab browsing mode. Load a FLASH movie with looping audio on one tab. Open Web Location->New Navigator Tab on same location one ore more times. You will end up with multiple looping audio tracks, one for each tab. I'm thinking the browser should be calling NPP_Destroy which is normally the way a plugin should be shut down when its no longer visible. I can provide a SWF for a looping audio test case if needed. I'd have to think this must be a known bug but initial searches failed. Sorry if its a duplicate.

I should revise my original comment. I'm assuming you aren't calling NPP_Destroy because you want the plugin to stay in the state it was at when it moved to a dactivated tab. Is there a protocol to tell a plugin to go into a state of suspended animation so I can shut down audio and shut off the frame rate timers in Flash?

>Is there a protocol to tell a plugin to go into a >state of suspended animation so I can shut down audio and shut off the frame >rate timers in Flash? we can always use |NPP_SetValue| http://developer.netscape.com/docs/manuals/communicator/plugin/pgfns.htm#1007057 to establish such king of protocol.

Should a plugin really be suspended when it's in an unfocused tab? When a plugin is in a window that's behind the focused window it still plays audio and animates, doesn't it? If you repeat this test for Open Web Location -> New Navigator Window, do you get multiple looping audio tracks?

I don't think this is a bug. plugins in background tabs shouldn't behave differently than plugins in background windows.

(In reply to comment #4) > I don't think this is a bug. plugins in background tabs shouldn't behave > differently than plugins in background windows. I wouldn't agree - a background window can be partially visible, a background tab is never visible and pretty much equivalent to the window being minimized. In both cases I'd expect the entire tab to be hibernated. Background tabs should do exactly two things: 1) load in the background [only until they are fully loaded] 2) display their title in the tab list. Anything else should be deferred until the tab is made visible (ie resizes, clock ticks, flash/gif animations, applets, etc). The only problem I see is that determining what exactly constitutes background loading is troublesome (i.e html flash/image/frame links are obvious, javascript preload is tougher, java applets loading images is even worse) - maybe they should be run in the background with some sort of slower timer click and no possible audio output? Evidently this should be some sort of configurable option as to the exact nature of this 'hack'/acceleration...