Clear browsing data when closing the app

[ppvnf]

What is the user problem or growth opportunity you want to see solved?

Fenix has the option Clear browsing data on exit, however this option won't clear your history when you close Firefox on the Android task switcher. I consider cumbersome having to open the Firefox menu (three dots) and then press quit.

This is especially a problem if you want to close Fenix and other Android tasks at the same time, since, in order to clear Firefox history, you can't just terminate all tasks together (because Fenix won't consider being closed as exiting the browser).

On Firefox for desktop, for instance, you don't need to click exit to trigger the similar option Automatically clear the cache. Simply closing the browser window is enough for the history to be cleaned (when this option is enabled).

How do you know that this problem exists today? Why is this important?

I found out because I am a Firefox user for desktop that is also trying to switch to the Android version (you have improved a lot, I am only waiting for extensions to be re-enabled).

It's a privacy issue, since closing Firefox (on the Android task switcher) won't clear the history.

Who will benefit from it?

Users who have the option "Clear browsing data on exit" enabled and are used to Firefox for desktop behavior.

┆Issue is synchronized with this Jira Task

[Dunexus]

Duplicate of https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/3950

Also, see this comment about why it would be hard to solve : https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/2152#issuecomment-492332285

Android does not provide a way to tell the difference between a user swiping an app closed and the app being killed in the background.

[ppvnf]

Duplicate of #3950

Also, see this comment about why it would be hard to solve : #2152 (comment)

Android does not provide a way to tell the difference between a user swiping an app closed and the app being killed in the background.

Thanks for pointing that out @Dunexus. Yesterday I really did a poor research on duplicate issues. Yesterday I tought this was a very niche thing to ask, but I've seen plenty of people here in Github wishing for the same thing as me.

However, I feel the discussion in #3950 should be updated (last post was in 2019) and, as you have mentioned, there's another issue discussing why it would be difficult to implement it https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/2152#issuecomment-492332285 (also from 2019). #5865 and #22064 also seems related to this one. Besides, there are some closed issues that discussed this problem, but without any update to #3950.

I am not entirely convinced that the answer you quoted is still applicable though. Android has gone through several updates since then and devices have become much more powerful, so apps being killed in the background are not very relevant right now IMO.

Also, I've seen some users reporting (https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/21818 and https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/5865#issuecomment-691676170) that before certain update swiping the Fenix app would have the same effect as exiting has right now:

PLEASE bring back the old implementation where swiping away will clear the data if that option is selected. Or at least an option to do do that.

Currently and for quite some time, I am able to emulate the behavior above in Kiwi Browser (Chromium for Android) using this extension without running into any problem related to the app being killed in the background. If Mozilla isn't bringing back this feature, will it be possible to use a similar addon when extensions are re-enabled in Fenix as a workaround?

Sorry, I am still not very experienced with Github. Should I close this issue and move the discussion to #3950, to #5865 or to #22064? #5865 seems the one with more discussion, altough the name of the issue is somewhat confusing.

Thanks in advance.

[Dunexus]

I am not entirely convinced that the answer you quoted is still applicable though. Android has gone through several updates since then and devices have become much more powerful, so apps being killed in the background are not very relevant right now IMO.

To be honest, this is beyond my knowledge. I quoted a dev as they probably understand the behavior better than I do.

Sorry, I am still not very experienced with Github. Should I close this issue and move the discussion to https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/3950, to https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/5865 or to https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/22064? https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/5865 seems the one with more discussion, altough the name of the issue is somewhat confusing.

I will let someone from dev team answering this but it could be great to consolidate all this discussion on a single issue.

[ppvnf]

I will let someone from dev team answering this but it could be great to consolidate all this discussion on a single issue.

True. I've found out an even more up to date related issue (https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/17634), so that one may be the best to continue the discussion, but I will wait for the dev team answer.

[ppvnf]

@kbrosnan would you mind verifying if the issues below (and this one) are indeed duplicates?

https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/3950, https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/5865, https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/17634 and https://github.com/mozilla-mobile/fenix/issues/22064

[cpeterso]

Thanks for finding the related bugs. This bug is a duplicate of #22064, which we're now tracking in Bugzilla here: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1807538