Toolbar button breaks and "stash root" is not created when "Never Remember History" option is enabled

[cottuli]

System Details

• OS Version: Windows 10 (20H2) & macOS Catalina 10.15.6 (19G73)
• Browser Version: Firefox 84.0.1 (64-bit)
• Tab Stash Version: 2.7.1

Installed Browser Extensions:

• None (new Firefox profile)

Describe the Bug

The toolbar button "Stash all (or selected) open tabs" has no effect when the "Never Remember History" option is set in Firefox's Privacy & Security Preferences. If the option is set when Tab Stash is first installed, Tab Stash won't create a "Tab Stash" folder under "Other Bookmarks."

Steps to Reproduce

1. Start with a new Firefox profile
2. Go to Firefox -> Preferences -> Privacy & Security -> History -> Firefox will "Never Remember History"
3. Restart Firefox
4. Install the Tab Stash add-on from addons.mozilla.org and observe that a "Tab Stash" stash root folder is not created in the "Other Bookmarks" folder
5. Click the "Stash all (or selected) open tabs" button. Observe that this has no effect.
6. Enable "Remember History" in Firefox Preferences and restart Firefox
7. Observe that a new Tab Stash folder has now been created in the "Other Bookmarks" folder, and that clicking the toolbar button now stashes tabs. Also observe that the toolbar button works in private browsing mode (which is supposedly what Firefox is using by default when "Never Remember History" is set).
8. Re-enable "Never Remember History" and restart Firefox. Observe that the Tab Stash sidebar menu now exists and that tabs can be added using the "Stash all (or selected) open tabs to this group" button or the "Stash the active tab to this group" button in the sidebar menu.
9. Observe that the "Stash all (or selected) open tabs" button in the toolbar menu and the "Delete this group button" in the sidebar menu, still have no effect. Also observe that the "Open all tabs in the group and delete the group" button does not delete the group after opening tabs.

Impact

Affects a small subset of users who have the "Never Remember History" option enabled.

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[josh-berry]

Unfortunately this seems to be a Firefox issue. From reading through Firefox bug reports, it seems the "Never Remember History" option really operates more like private browsing in that it aggressively prevents websites, and extensions, from using any local storage whatsoever, even for temporary storage.

This is a big problem for Tab Stash because it maintains a few databases in local storage for things like remembering whether stashes are open or collapsed, storing deleted items, remembering website icons, etc. Worse, there seem to be some situations where even the basic extension APIs for accessing bookmarks, tabs, etc. aren't loaded properly in "Never Remember History" mode. While it might be possible to detect if local storage is available (indeed, some websites are doing this to find out if a user is in private browsing mode...), the other issues with bookmarks/tabs not being available can't be worked around, I'm afraid.

The good news is, this seems to be something Mozilla is actively working on for websites and for extensions. In the meantime, unfortunately the best I can offer right now is "don't use 'Never Remember History'" with Tab Stash (or any other extension that needs to use local storage).

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news there.