Firefox/Projects/Connecting Status

The status bar has been removed, and with it went status messages about the progress of a page load. The result is that when a network connection or page takes a long time to load, the browser can look hung.

• Project Lead: beltzner
• Development Lead: tbd

Status

Design stage, need to find implementation resources.

Goals

• Provide feedback for slow loading pages

Non Goals

• Provide status that can be used to debug connection problems

Timeline / Milestones

• Jan 14 - Complete design proposal
• Jan 19 - Patch ready for review
• Jan 21 - Patch checked into tree

These are the bugs of interest:

Bug	Owner	Status
bug 603777 - bug tracking implementation	margaret	bitrotted

Requirements

• Shows difference between connecting and downloading states
• Only shows when there is a long (>1s) delay in loading a document
• Doesn't "chirp" as much as previous statusbar text

Design Specification

• EVENT: page navigation
  • backwards throbber begins
• IF: no data received within 1s
  • backwards throbber continues
  • "Connecting..." appears in link preview area
• EVENT: connection is obtained
  • backwards throbber continues
• IF: no paint event within 1s
  • "Waiting..." appears in link preview area
• EVENT: paint event
  • forward throbber starts
  • link preview area cleared

Questions

• should we show the URL that we're waiting for?
• should we show that we're waiting after the first paint event?

Dependencies

• Status bar removed

Testing

• QA will need to test on slower connections / slow loading pages

Related Projects

• Status Bar Removal
• Link Preview in Location Bar