Firefox 3.0 makes everything annoyingly huge

Also, changing the zoom level doesn't really help.. I can't zoom out far enough for the images to be "normal" size again.

Same here!

I'm using a laptop with very high DPI screen. Maybe thats the problem, but it's really anoying. Huge icons at the bars with normal text plus very big text on webpages.

I find a solution for this problem!!!

1) Go to about:config
2) Search "dpi". The value may be set to -1 (maybe auto-detection)
3) Change it to 96 (default dpi)
4) Enjoy Firefox 3!!!

BTW: I thing this should be set to 96 by default. With the zoom the small text sizes on high DPI screens can be solved, and if you want to use small fonts it's just your option. You can change it in gnome.

No, the DPI shouldn't be set to 96 on a 150dpi screen. It should be set to 150.

firefox should cope and offer a way to configure its size (for people who like small images with large text), instead of forcing everything to be huge.

I also have big/upscaled images in epiphany, even when I zoom back to minimal zoom level.

The strange thing is that not only the content is scaled, but the UI as well - all my buttons (Back etc). This is the worst part of this bug as it makes firefox look completely inconsistent with the rest of GNOME.

Mikael Nilsson: Have you tried to follow this steps:

1) Go to about:config
2) Search "dpi". The value may be set to -1 (maybe auto-detection)
3) Change it to 96 (default dpi)
4) Enjoy Firefox 3!!!

That should change the size inmediatly. Now we need to find the proper solution for mainstream use.

Obviously:
- The interface should not be scaled
- The page maybe could be interesting, but should be selectable on the preferences
- The scale is bad. If you have a 150+ dpi screen the size should be more or less double in each cordinate (150+ could be seen as almost double of the standart 96 dpi), not quadruple as is happening now.

¿s this bug posted to mozilla bugzilla too?

I confirm the problem also affects Epiphany, and it's worse (no workarrounds) because you can't change de dpi setting in about:config.

Opposite to FF3, only the page is scaled. The interface is the same as other gnome apps, as it's pure GTK, not rendered by XUL.

Maybe a dpi setting of 0 help?

marking as beta milestone - flipping the default dpi setting should be done for hardy if it helps some and has no regressions for other users.

I assume that this should be worked around in xulrunner-1.9. Keeping firefox-3.0 task open until we know more.

taking the bug. considering this a blocker for release.

Could you please post the output of:

xdpyinfo | grep resolution

and

gconftool-2 -g /desktop/gnome/font_rendering/dpi

Thanks,
 - Alexander

this is a gfx/layout issue. the code for this lives in xulrunner-1.9. Closing the firefox part.

this is a gfx/layout issue. the code for this lives in xulrunner-1.9. closing the epiphany-browser task

martijn@hplaptop:~$ xdpyinfo | grep resolution
  resolution: 147x147 dots per inch
martijn@hplaptop:~$ gconftool-2 -g /desktop/gnome/font_rendering/dpi
146

bisho@fenix:~$ xdpyinfo | grep resolution
  resolution: 147x147 dots per inch
bisho@fenix:~$ gconftool-2 -g /desktop/gnome/font_rendering/dpi
96

Still this happens with FF beta 3. Fonts are rendered normal (same as other gnome apps) but icons on the interface are doubled.

This is bug https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=394103 on firefox's bugzilla.

I still suggest that:
- The interface should not be scalled. Text is rendered right now same size as the gnome desktop. Icons should be the same size that the rest of the gnome desktop.
- Scaling on the page contents could be useful for some people. But usually people with high dpi screen wants the things small and have a lot of contents on the screen.
   Posible solutions:
      - Scale only in *really* high dpi screens:
After scaling x2 in a 147dpi screen as mine the base resolution is 147/2= 73 dpi. That's *really* huge. I would consider scaling only when base resolution is 120-150 dpi when the human eye does not see the separate pixels. i.e. in a 300 dpi screen a x2 zoom would have base resolution of 150 dpi and things will look pretty. 73 dpi blurried x2 scaled image pixels are not pretty.
      - Ask the user for his preference:
Show a dialog like this:
You screen has been detected to have very high resolution and the pages will be shown tiny (XX% the normal size on other screens). You can enable a default page zoom adequate to you screen in the preferences settings.

It should probably be noted that Hardy has just changed the firefox package to be the beta3, so the primary browser now has the bug.

I also had this problem and finally found the answer in this thread.

Suggestion: just make firefox-3/xulrunner use the gconf DPI settings. My screen has a DPI of 131 but I set it to 96 in the 'Apearance' preferences to avoid having huge fonts everywhere. I didn't know firefox had its own DPI settings.

i have a fix attempt in my ppa: https://edge.launchpad.net/~asac/+archive ... please get xulrunner-1.9 - 1.9~b3+nobinonly-0ubuntu3~asac1 from there and let me know if this fixes the problem for you.

Alexander Sack you fixed the problem for me. Thanks! I hope it does the same for others. Did you want any other information Alexander?

With this epiphany renders graphics at normal scale. Text still is quite big compared to firefox.

Mozilla works well, same as setting manually layout.css.dpi to 96 in about:config.

I could attach a screenshot if you want it.

please attach screenshots and tell me what font dpi setting you have in the gnome appearance dialog. If possible attach ffox 3 screens as well.

ok i think you already posted your font dpi. anyway, verifying that its still 96 would be nice. Thanks!

I attach a screenshot of epiphany & Firefox with xulrunner-1.9 - 1.9~b3+nobinonly-0ubuntu3~asac1.

As I said, mozilla is now completely right. Epiphany still shows big fonts.

I have tested setting 147 dpi in gnome font settings and only fonts in window interface are scaled in firefox, epiphany and the rest of gnome apps. The HTML page rendered in firefox & epiphany maintains same image & font sizes than with using 96dpi.

A few more data points:

I am having problems with images: many of them appear as black rectangles. Scaling them down (using the Image zoom extension) to what should be the correct size causes them to be visible. As they are scaled down, the actual image content moves into the black rectangle from the bottom - as though the image has an offset that is being scaled as the image is scaled.

I second last post, because I experience it too. Dragging picture out of place shows it scaled smaller. Sometimes it shows half of the picture.

this bug isn't about black rectangles. There is another bug about it. If possible, please stay on topic to not add to much noise to a bug :).

Thanks,
 - Alexander

> As I said, mozilla is now completely right. Epiphany still shows big fonts.

Does this happen if you move your epiphany profile away and start over with a clean one? (e.g. move $HOME/.gnome2/epiphany to some backup place to test this.

I have this problem when using Nvidia's Twinhead (dual head), gconf font dpi setting affects font size (after restart) but the widgets are still huge.

I feel the same:
"No, the DPI shouldn't be set to 96 on a 150dpi screen. It should be set to 150.
Firefox should cope and offer a way to configure its size (for people who like small images with large text), instead of forcing everything to be huge."

There should be options (in FF) wheter or not you want:
- The interface
- The page
to be scaled (and to what size)

Is this bug already posted to mozilla bugzilla?

It's already posted on mozilla bugzilla Excogitation.

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=394103

> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=394103

I was bemused that the Firefox folks have sort of the same knee-jerk presumption of guilt towards the gtk that some Ubuntu folks have towards the nVidia driver as the root cause of all display problems.

See also Bug 191791, where you'll find more reports and an interim solution. As noted, xdpyinfo (147x145) matches my display (1920x1200, 13"x8.25"). Gnome font preference is 96DPI. Changing layout.css.dpi to 96 resolves the problem.

> "the DPI shouldn't be set to 96 on a 150dpi screen. It
> should be set to 150. Firefox should cope ... "

See comment #40 in the Mozilla bug report for a response.

Hi all,

please be realistic. You cannot scale images except by 2, 4, etc. ... so saying "firefox should scale to 150 dpi" is just a wish that will never happen (note: i am not talking about fonts here, but about images).

So in short: this bug is not a wish-o-matic. I try to fix this bug, but for that i need answers to my questions and no additional wishes or even whining.more wishes and whining.

OK, back to work: ... can you please test the package i posted above and tell me if it fixes the "everything is annoyingly huge" issue for you?

BTW, if there is any body subscribed to this bug with a dpi >=192, please just #ubuntu-mozillateam channel on irc.freenode.net and ping me (asac) ... i have some other experiment for you.

Thanks,
 - Alexander

"You cannot scale images except by 2, 4, etc."

That is not correct, as a simple look at The Gimp/Eye of Gnome/gThumb/etc. will show. You might make the argument that "you cannot scale images *quickly* except for integer scaling", but that is really not an issue save for very old machines (which are unlikely to be running high DPI displays) or for animated images (but there you can scale the individual frames once then just loop them).

It isn't even correct to say "Firefox lacks the ability to scale images by a non-integer amount", as it *HAS* to do that if an image's native size does not match what the HTML IMG tag specifies.

ok, given the performance complains we frequently get, we cannot scale images by non integer values efficiently.

ok, we'll take the "don't scale images" patch for hardy.

If you have specific issues after that, please open a new bug.

Thanks,
  - Alexander

Alexander,

In the latest updates, the change log for xulrunner and xulrunner-gnome-support say:

  fix LP: #175904 "Firefox 3.0 makes everything annoyingly huge" ...

in multiple places, all related to this bug. As you can see, this is Bug 178558. Bug 175904 is completely different.

This bug is gone with newest updates, thanks. Now FF 3.0 looks nice with huge screen/dpi.

sorry ... no idea why this wasn't automatically closed by upload:

xulrunner-1.9 (1.9~b4+nobinonly-0ubuntu1) hardy; urgency=low

  * new upstream release 1.9~b4 fixes:
    - LP: #194486 - "printing in Firefox 3 Beta 3 is broken"
    - LP: #192505 - "Where's my home button?"
    - LP: #44062 - "Firefox allows cookies to be set for second-level
      domain hierarchies"
    - LP: #181575 - "pressing Enter in URL bar selects mouse hover target
      in substring-search pop-down"

  [ Fabien Tassin <email address hidden> ]
  * Drop patches applied upstream
    - drop debian/patches/bz344818_cairo_xrender.patch
    - drop debian/patches/bzXXX_fix_pyxpcom_build_failure.patch
  * Update diverged patch:
    - update debian/patches/dom_inspector_support_for_prism.patch
  * Add support for system hunspell
    - update debian/rules
  * Add optional support for system sqlite3 (we need >= 3.5 not in hardy)
    - update debian/rules
  * Update clean rule to make it simpler and more friendly with
    mozilla-devscripts
    - update debian/rules
  * Drop DEB_AUTO_UPDATE_DEBIAN_CONTROL cdbs variable completely. It was
    wrongly set to zero
    - update debian/rules
  * Update clean rule now that Mozilla bug 333308 has landed.
    To prevent a bug in cdbs where patches are unapplied before distclean
    is performed, set DEB_MAKE_CLEAN_TARGET to $(NULL) and add call
    distclean ourselves before cdbs files are included
    - update debian/rules
  * There're still some leftovers after distclean despite latest
    Mozilla bug 333308 patch. Fix it once again and report it upstream
    - add debian/patches/bz333308_attXXXX_make_clean_cleaner.patch
    - update debian/patches/series
  * Drop obsolete comment for extensions
    - update debian/rules
  * Stop build-tree/mozilla/README to be shipped as a doc by setting
    cdbs DEB_INSTALL_DOCS_ALL to $(NULL)
    - update debian/rules
  * Drop obsolete TODO file
    - drop debian/TODO

  [ Alexander Sack < <email address hidden>> ]
  * fix "remember password" dialog for embedders that don't provide
    a branding chrome
    - add debian/patches/bzXXX_attXXX_fix_remember_password_for_embedders_without_branding.patch
    - update debian/patches/series
  * fix LP: #175904 "Firefox 3.0 makes everything annoyingly huge" by not
    scaling images based on dpi.
    - add debian/patches/bz394103_dont_scale_images.patch
    - update debian/patches/series
  * add alternative patch for LP: #175904 "Firefox 3.0 makes everything
    annoyingly huge" by scaling images for 192dpi, 288dpi, etc. instead
    of 142dpi, 238dpi and so on. (this patch is not applied atm and is
    included for testing purpose)
    - add debian/patches/bz394103_scale_images_for_192+dpi.patch
  * add libsqlite3-dev to Build-Depends in order to effectively enable
    optional system sqlite feature on buildd's with sqlite > 3.5
    - update debian/control
  * bump build requirements on nspr and nss to >= 4.7.0~1.9b4 and
    >= 3.12.0~1.9b4 respectively
    - update debian/control

 -- Alexander Sack < <email address hidden>> Tue, 11 Mar 2008 02:06:46 +0100

Did the fix btw fix all your problems? I had this on up-to-date hardy, and couldn't get it to work besides setting the firefox dpi manually.

Although, beta 5 is probably coming soon so I'll test that.

The new xulrunner fixed all problems for me (all but fonts on epiphany, that still are quite big by default, but it's not that annoying).

Timo: Are you using an updated xulrunner?

After an X crash, I have this bug with a Hardy up-to-date. I've workarounded it in firefox by setting the DPI in about:config to 96, but yelp, devhelp, epiphany and liferea are still affected.

It doesn't affects images, only fonts, BTW.

I guess that could be fixed in GNOME by making Xulrunner use the value of "gconftool-2 -g /desktop/gnome/font_rendering/dpi". dunno how feasible that is

Perhaps this may be useful:
emilio@saturno:~$ grep DPI /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(**) intel(0): DPI set to (90, 142)

emilio@saturno:~$ gconftool-2 -g /desktop/gnome/font_rendering/dpi
96

This is quite strange: if I set the firefox dpi back to -1, only Launchpad pages have large fonts... all the rest I've seen have normal fonts.

Yelp, Liferea and devhelp are still wrong

Ok, I've been debugging this with Alexander's help on IRC, and I've tracked it down to ~/.gnome2/monitors.xml. Removing that file and logging in again fixed my font issues.
So this wasn't Xulrunner's fault (at least not directly).

I still have this problem (huge fonts on launchpad.net) on a computer I have updated to hardy today using firefox beta 5. monitors.xml does not exist. I had to manually change layout.css.dpi to 96 in about:config to workaround the bug - other xulrunner programs like epiphany are (well, of course) still affected.

This is not a bug 118745 duplicate. Nothing about getting X to use an appropriate DPI will directly change the Firefox behavior. A good fix for this requires an upstream solution from the folks at mozilla.org.