Frost currently unusable -Cannot load News Feed, Messages, or Menu

[GibberMeJenks]

• [x] I have verified that the bug does not occur in my mobile browser (at https://touch.facebook.com/)

Describe the bug The issue began roughly on June 8, 2023. When opening Frost, the only tab that seems to work is Notifications. However, when trying to use news feed and/or messages, nothing loads. I also attempted to downgrade to different Frost builds with no luck.

Sadly, the app is unusable in this state as the user cannot reply to messages, interact or comment on posts, etc. Facebook seems to have changed an algorithm though I was not able to confirm.

To Reproduce Steps to reproduce the behaviour:

1. Open frost and touch or attempt to load News Feed or Messages
2. News Feed shows stories but rest is stuck on 'loading' page
3. Messages does not load at all and shows blank screen

Details (please provide at least the app version):

• App Version: 3.2.0 (latest)
• Device: Pixel 6a
• Android Version: 13

[HarriBuh]

I disagree, my Frost is working without all of these issues.

[AllanWang]

Facebook behaviour highly varies between users, and it isn't necessarily because of this app. So it's likely a valid report, but it may also fix itself. My work for Frost is focused on a new implementation (see readme/pinned issue), so I'm unlikely to provide updates for the current one until I get somewhere.

[syphyr]

Try turning off overlays

[terroirman]

I get the same issue. Anything we can do to troubleshoot/fix the issue through our Facebook account ?

[GibberMeJenks]

Try turning off overlays

Thanks for this suggestion @syphyr ! Sadly, it did not work for me :(

Facebook behaviour highly varies between users, and it isn't necessarily because of this app. So it's likely a valid report, but it may also fix itself. My work for Frost is focused on a new implementation (see readme/pinned issue), so I'm unlikely to provide updates for the current one until I get somewhere.

Thanks for the reply @AllanWang. Like @terroirman mentioned, is there any settings in our FB accounts that you suggest to look into or try changing to test and troubleshoot? For me, I don't believe when this first started happening where I changed any settings, etc. so it's interesting to know how it varies between users! I have also tried uninstalling and reinstalling with no luck sadly.

As always thanks for your work on this! The app has been incredibly useful and handy, particularly for messaging :)

[Julientroploin]

Confirmed on my device... The bug appeared approximately on the same period (I noticed it last WE).

[mrtaxi]

Hi! The same issue, OnePlus 7, 12/256, Android 11. Thank you for your app!

[AllanWang]

fwiw, I'm noticing this too now for messages:

Seems like a facebook problem though, since it also happens on my desktop, and this build has nothing custom. Going from the main screen and hitting the messenger icon works, but refreshing the page when you are already on messages is blank

The other tabs should be working though, and some of them may be Frost issues

[natanvarga]

I can confirm this issue on a fresh installation of frost. Redmi Note 9, MIUI 12.

[tkalfaoglu]

Unfortunately same issue. Android 11. Huawei p30 lite..

[HarriBuh]

I don't have this issue,except for the broken message tab (which has been broken since forever..), running on the latest.version of 3.2.0 on Pixel 7, A13

[mccoys]

Same issue here. V3.2.0, pixel 4a, A13

Freezes a lot during a few seconds as well

[cpt00]

Same here, I was on a older version 2.3.0 and I thought it was the issue. Update it, and same behavior. Around 1st week of June. Tried on S23 Ultra and OnePlus 5 on android 10. Facebook must have updated something.

I've opened a xda thread, seems like no other alternative, the others are dead, like metal, LC, vanced, etc. Using lite FB for now, but it's wayyyy to intense with ads, like way too much, 90% of my feed is ads, and I can't maintain groups since I need to scroll way too many ads pages before seeing a new group post

[RobertdaRed]

Same issue

[Gnomasz]

The issue with the "messages" tab also occurs on Sony Xperia L3, with an additional error message (translated from Polish):

The inbox of your page is currently unavailable in the Facebook app or in mobile web browsers. You can access your messages though a web browser on a PC, or by downloading the Meta Business Suite app or the Messenger app from the app store.

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GibberMeJenks wrote:

[x] I have verified that the bug does not occur in my mobile browser (at https://touch.facebook.com/)

Please note that neither touch.facebook.com, m.facebook.com nor mbasic.facebook.com can access messages anymore. Currently only www.facebook.com and www.messenger.com can access Facebook's messages. AFAIK, the latest version of KaiOS, a feature phone OS, suffers from the lack of a tool to access the Messenger since its release in 2021. Meta also removed the Messenger Lite from the Play Store. I used to use it, but in the recent days it stopped working properly.

[Flinger-Of-Flans]

Same issue for me, just met with a blank screen, re-installing doesn't fix it, I did notice though when fist starting after a fresh install it jumps past a screen prior to logging in before you get a chance to hit ok

[whitis]

Can confirm. Frost has been completely unusable for weeks. Never loads the feed, or anything else, not even the about page. progress indicator hangs at about 10%. Clearing cache doesn't work. Uninstalling and reinstalling doesn't work. Moto G Stylus. Android 11. m.facebook.com does work on same device in firefox. Wifi or Google Fi, VPN turned off.

I do sometimes have pages (though I can't remember any examples), unrelated to Facebook, that don't load/stall when they should, so some suspicion should be directed towards whatever system services, or internal code, you are using to download pages. Hanging consistently at a small percentage resbles path MTU discovery problems with a black hole router in the network somewhere that discards ICMP would fragment messages. Giving user ability to set TCP MSS to a smaller value, such as 535, may help.

[GibberMeJenks]

Small update to this - for some reason since the issue first started for me back in June 2023, I noticed that all features (news feed, messaging, etc.) suddenly started working again.

I did not change any settings and kept the same version from when I uninstalled and reinstalled a month ago. I am guessing Facebook did something on the back end again which restored functionality.

[4gh22sab]

Small update to this - for some reason since the issue first started for me back in June 2023, I noticed that all features (news feed, messaging, etc.) suddenly started working again.

I came here to suggest changing to touch.facebook.com for the main interface inside frost which was the only web interface working for me. The comment above had me check again today and it does look like facebook may be in progress of fixing things (August 2023). The main feeds seem to work better but there may be some remaining issues. Messages and events are not working and I find I much prefer the frost interfaces to these over the facebook/messenger ones.

[Julientroploin]

I've seen the bug is labelled as "unverified". What are the step to follow to have this label removed ? It seems we are multiple user to face this bug.

Now, here is the situation on my device :

• the main tab work once in a while ;
• the "Notification" tab works most of the time, but not systematically

[creativetrendsapps]

I do sometimes have pages (though I can't remember any examples), unrelated to Facebook, that don't load/stall when they should, so some suspicion should be directed towards whatever system services, or internal code, you are using to download pages. Hanging consistently at a small percentage resbles path MTU discovery problems with a black hole router in the network somewhere that discards ICMP would fragment messages. Giving user ability to set TCP MSS to a smaller value, such as 535, may help.

You do realize Frost is a Web wrapper for the Facebook mobile site, right? All of this has nothing to do with the app.

[AllanWang]

Frost is a web wrapper, though it uses some logic to hide and show the screen mid transitions, or else the css can't be injected. That is probably one of the reasons for blank pages, though I do see facebook just blanking on its own on my desktop too.

touch.facebook.com is a different site depending on your device. As is m.facebook.com. The one needed requires different html tags so we can distinguish between links, pictures, etc. Loading touch.facebook.com on your desktop may show a variant where everything is divs, and nothing can really be parsed clearly. This is 'new', and did not occur when there was a last update to Frost.

All in all, these variations, plus the solutions I'm interested in having their own issues, is why development is slow. I personally don't even use Facebook anymore, and I only log in occasionally do see if I have new people to add. I'm still interested in fixing things, as this is my 'main' personal dev project, but it's usually limited to a few weeks a year while I'm travelling

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I've also debated just removing a bunch of features and making this something like tinfoil, but with notifications. At that point however, I feel like people should just use their browser (or download another one so cookies are separate), as it would mostly do the same thing.

[DaKingof]

When I first log into the app, I see it shows information from my FB account for just a split second...then all of a sudden, it all goes blank, and I get the same issue everyone else is having. Nothing loads at all. So I can tell I am getting some of this information on the first load, but now the nav bar shows it loading at like 15% and just stops.