Privacy Browser Android

The two devices that I know experience these problem are a Moto E (4) Plus and a Moto G (5). Perhaps it relates to some customization that Motorola has done to their devices.

This also affects a Moto G (6). It is discussed at https://redmine.stoutner.com/boards/1/topics/37.

According to https://redmine.stoutner.com/issues/606 this also affects LineageOS 16.0.

Those experiencing this problem who would like to help test a possible fix can download a debug build of Privacy Browser Free from the following URL (will expire in a few days):

https://owncloud.stoutner.com/index.php/s/KQrSrpSoMsI3I9M

This can be installed alongside your current Privacy Browser app without causing problems. This debug build changes the order that things are loaded during app initialization to make it more similar to the 3.4.1 release.

It did not fix it for me.

For what it's worth, I noticed that when using the system's light theme, I first have to open a new tab to be able to open a URL or bookmark (both tabs will then work). On the other hand, switching to using the system's dark theme doesn't have this issue, it behaves like the previous versions w/o the theme support.

Further, when starting PrivacyBrowser with the light theme, then going to "Settings" and switching to "Dark", it restarts and now has three empty tabs open. Going from dark to light doesn't, it still has only one tab open after restarting.

Correct. What is happening is that the app isn't initializing correctly, causing the tabs and the WebView displayed to not be the ones that the system things they are. So, when it tries to load a bookmark or perform some other function, it doesn't work correctly (it is updating a WebView that either doesn't exist or isn't displayed on the screen).

Switching tabs resets the current WebView, which can fix some of the problems depending on exactly what is wrong. Similarly, changing the theme restarts the activity which also resets a large number of items, and sometimes they come back in the right order. If not, you can end up with things like three empty tabs.

For some people it works better if they are using the light theme. For some people it works better if they are using the dark theme. This is because, with the new Day/Night theme, when the app starts, if it is running a different theme than the OS (prior to Android 9, the OS is always running the light theme unless battery saver is enabled, in which case it is always running the dark theme), the app stops and restarts into the new theme during initialization. Depending on what is going on, this double initialization either helps or hurts.

But none of this gets to the core of the problem. I still have no idea why three Motorola phones and one LineageOS device have problems when it works perfectly well for everyone else. And unless we can get to the root of what is causing the problem, it is very difficult to resolve it. Short of getting ahold of a Motorola phone for testing, I'm not sure where to proceed from here.

I borrowed a Motorola XT1585 (Droid Turbo 2) and was able to replicate the problem. The root cause is that the Populate Bookmarks AsyncTask would start but not finish before the app was restarted. This caused two tasks to run simultaneously, which would populate 2 initial tabs (only 1 visible), making the loading of bookmarks unhappy.

I have created another debug build of Privacy Browser Free that cancels the AsyncTask if the instance state is saved.

https://owncloud.stoutner.com/index.php/s/4bg6TUyYqqSJwaO

This does cause a problem if someone navigates away from Privacy Browser while the blocklists are loading (they end up stuck on the loading screen). But that is an uncommon enough scenario that I don't think many people will run into it. The permanent solution is to switch the Blocklists to a ViewModel (https://redmine.stoutner.com/issues/597), but that is a complex enough tasks that I would prefer to push it off.

Can someone who has this problem test the above debug build? If it works for you, I will release 3.5.1.

Now that I know the root cause of the problem, I have been able to recreate symptoms on non-Motorola devices, like a Pixel 2 XL and a Pixel 4 depending on the theme settings used.

Thank you, Mr. Stoutner, for your detailed explanation of the problem at hand.

All I can say is that yes, I am able to open bookmarks/URLs right away using the light theme with your new build. However, it gets stuck on the blocklist load screen when switching from dark to light and vice versa. I then have to forcibly close and re-open it.

I also noticed that the WebView theme doesn't always get honored. I have set the UI to "dark" and WebView to "light", though sometimes WebView's dark theme gets applied instead. This affects 3.5 and the debug build.

Thank you, Mr. Stoutner, the issues I described above seem to have been resolved with the newest build. It no longer gets stuck loading blocklists either when switching themes.

Downloaded latest free version and this one works well as far as I can see.

Richard

Oh, BTW, LineageOS-16