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Bug 12844

Summary: netscape-flash version 6 crashes a lot
Product: Gentoo Linux Reporter: Georgi Georgiev <chutz+bugs.gentoo.org>
Component: Current packagesAssignee: Karl Trygve Kalleberg (RETIRED) <karltk>
Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX    
Severity: normal CC: blkdeath
Priority: High    
Version: 1.4_rc1   
Hardware: x86   
OS: All   
Whiteboard:
Package list:
Runtime testing required: ---

Description Georgi Georgiev 2002-12-28 11:48:57 UTC
I want the version 5 ebuild back!

I don't know if it is a problem with my setup, but I've always had troubles with
the new flash. An example for a site that crashes my mozilla is
http://www.idsoftware.com
I wait for it to load, move the mouse over what i think is a flash navigation
menu on top and mozilla quits without any messages on stdout or stderr (i
started it with /usr/lib/mozilla/mozilla-bin from a term). I want to install
back the old one.
Comment 1 Georgi Georgiev 2002-12-28 11:53:28 UTC
Ok, i got the ebuild from cvs.

Still i'll leave the bug open hoping others can confirm the crashes I am
experiencing.
Comment 2 Georgi Georgiev 2002-12-28 11:58:36 UTC
I am starting to have the feeling I am talking too much, but
http://www.idsoftware.com did not crash me when armed with flash 5.0.51
The one that was crasing was 6.0.69, but I had the same occasional crashes with
older 6.0.xx versions too. With older than 1.2.1 mozillas too.
Comment 3 Karl Trygve Kalleberg (RETIRED) gentoo-dev 2003-05-03 08:49:23 UTC
Newer flashes seem better.
Comment 4 Montag 2003-08-25 01:23:13 UTC
I tried flash 6.0.69 and 6.0.79, but both of them hang the browser when the animation played include sounds and multimedia buttons.
The browsers I tried are all Gecko-based (Mozilla, Galeon, Epiphany).
The only thing I can do is kill the process and don't recover the browsing session (in Galeon and Epiphany).
I don't think it's a problem browser-related, because the same thing happens with gstflashplayer (the stand-alone Flash player installed with netscape-flash)
Comment 5 Georgi Georgiev 2003-08-25 01:55:53 UTC
montag: Can you include some specific URLs so that the bug can be reopened?
Comment 6 Montag 2003-08-25 07:51:51 UTC
You can try it with this sites:
http://www.powerstrike.net/Tehkan/mamejump.html
http://www.xiaoxiaomovie.com/movie/movie02.htm
http://www.ngi.it/intro/intro3_high.htm
http://www.sadeem.net/main.htm

I want to clarify a couple of things of my previous comment:
1) the stand-alone player is gflashplayer and not gstflashplayer;
2) gflashplayer seems to hang, as the plug-in, if you try to play the animation in streaming (from the web-- you have to specify the .swf file, not the .htm that points at it). Unlikely the plug-in, the player doesn't really hang - sorry if I said the contrary - but downloads the entire file before start playing! Not really in streaming...
You can try playing in gflashplayer the following animation:
http://www.taucher0815.de/Flovies/mamejump.swf
This is the same animation of the first site in the upper list. As you can see, it is played without problems in the player, but it hangs the browser.
3) gflashplayer works if the animation is a local file (file://)
4) the plug-in fails even if the animation is a local file.

So, in the end, maybe *it is* a browser-related problem.

Currently I'm using:
- GNOME 2.2.1
- lib-compat 1.2
- glibc 2.3.2-r1
- mozilla 1.4-r3
- epiphany 0.9.1

I really don't remember when I first saw this problem in my system... if it was at netscape-flash upgrade from 5.0.x series or if it was at Gentoo upgrade from 1.2. For sure it wasn't present with Gentoo 1.2 and netscape-flash 5.0.x
Comment 7 Montag 2003-08-27 09:09:36 UTC
http://www.fratellimattioli.it/pranzoservito.swf

This animation hangs both the browser and gflashplayer.
It's an italian trivia game: press the OK button to spin the wheel, than, when it stops, choose between the four answers. When you press one of these answers Flash hangs.
Tested with netscape-flash-6.0.79
Comment 8 Georgi Georgiev 2003-08-27 09:48:24 UTC
Montag: all the links you've posted work fine in my browser. I am ruuning the trunk snapshot of mozilla labeled 2003-08-25-08 and my flags are:

+java +crypt -ipv6 +gtk2 +ssl -ldap -gnome -mozsvg -mozcalendar -mozaccess -mozp3p -mozxmlterm +moznoirc +moznomail +moznocompose -moznoxft
Comment 9 Montag 2003-08-31 01:48:30 UTC
Thanks for the test; in your words I read Mozilla's innocence. 
It has to do with sounds, because animations (even interactive) without it never hang the browser.
I tried killing "esd" (I'm using GNOME) and now everything's working. This is stranger than before because Flash do plays sounds through esd! (and it always worked before).
There's probably some new bad interactions between the two that ends with Flash hanging when there are more than two audio streams coming from the plugin... but it's only my guess.
I don't consider killing esd a solution, but it's better than nothing...
Comment 10 Georgi Georgiev 2003-08-31 04:40:28 UTC
I think you've got it wrong. Flash seems to be accessing the sound device directly. I am hearing one of your flashes right now and there is no esd process running.

In your case, esd has already opened the device and flash hangs while waiting to open it itself. I don't know about multple streams -- my sound card supports multiple "open"s, so I cannot verify.
Comment 11 Montag 2003-09-01 07:42:29 UTC
http://www.taucher0815.de/Flovies/mamejump.swf

Yes, without esd every Flash movie plays right.
It's with esd running that they hang and that's because Flash waits the sound device to be avalable... ok, but the strange thing happening is this: if I try to play the animation I linked up here, Flash plays the intro without problem even with esd running... with the thunder sound! It hangs only after it, when it should begin the "Jump" sample. That's strange, because if Flash really needs direct access to the sound device to work, it should hang before the intro, isn't it?

I have an intel810 as sound card and ALSA does not support multiple channels on its driver.
Comment 12 Montag 2003-09-01 07:46:35 UTC
http://jp.shockwave.com/games/puzzles/zookeeper/zookeeper.swf

Oh, and there are a lot of other animations and games with sound that do work directly from the browser and with esd running (eg. the one I linked up here)... and never hangs!
So... I really don't know.
Comment 13 Montag 2003-09-02 04:15:38 UTC
Today it happened the same with XMMS, so it's probably a bug in esd and not in Flash. In effect there was a new esound ebuild a couple of mounth ago... That's good, so we now know where really is the problem: it isn't in Flash but in esd!
Comment 14 Montag 2003-09-02 10:21:03 UTC
Ok, now it's clear that my problem is totally unrelated with Flash.
It's my esound that's acting strangely... it doesn't mix sound streams anymore!
I'll try to understand whoat's happening.
Thanks for the help, without you I would have continued in thinking it was a Flash fault.
Comment 15 Montag 2003-09-02 11:17:38 UTC
Last comment to say that re-emerging esound and alsa (driver|lib) has fixed my problem.
Thanks again.