Bug#501691: the case of the missing 's'

[Mike Hommey]

On Thu, Oct 09, 2008 at 12:05:40PM -0400, Joey Hess wrote:
> Package: epiphany-browser
> Version: 2.22.3-3
> Severity: normal
> 
> My sister was unable to type lower-case 's' into web forms or epiphany's
> url bar, after logging into her gmail account. Investigation showed:
> 
> - Typing 's' resulted in apparently nothing happening.
> - Cut and paste of 's' worked.
> - Entering upper-case 'S' worked.
> - Logging out of gmail did not fix the problem.
> - The problem affected other tabs than the one used to log into gmail.
> - The problem did not show up when using firefox to log into the same
>   gmail account.
> - The problem did not manifest when using epiphany as another user on
>   the same machine and logging into the same gmail account.
> - Closing the affected epiphany window, while leaving another epiphany window
>   open seemed to fix the problem (until the next time gmail was logged
>   into).
> - gmail has a link at the top "Older version". Clicking on this link immediatly
>   fixed the problem. (Oddly, it continued to say "Older version".)
> - In gmail's settings, "Keyboard shortcuts" were off. (Only checked
>   after clicking on "Older version" tho.
> 
> My guess is it somehow involves gmails keyboard shortcuts, which are
> documented to include a key binding for the 's' key, along with other
> keys (that did not seem to be affected).
> 
> I don't understand how gmail's key bindings work, or how epiphany could
> allow one web site to take over a key even once that website was closed.
> This seems likely to involve some sort of security hole in epiphany.

I'm using epiphany-gecko and the new gmail interface too, and there is
no such problem with the s key. Maybe you should try to take a look at X
key events...

Mike