Friday, July 10, 2009

Aweful default behavior: Firefox's downloads list focusing after download

When you download a file with Firefox, the default behavior is that when the download is complete (possibly a second or so later), the "Downloads" window displays. That's probably rational if you chose to save the file. But if you chose to open the file, it is really very disruptive behavior. Because just before that Downloads window displays, usually the application which handles that file type has displayed first. The effect is that you flash to the file you want and then DOH!, there you are looking at the Firefox Downloads window. Very irritating. Luckily it can be disabled trivially (http://www.technixupdate.com/firefox-tip-how-to-close-the-annoying-download-window-automatically/), but it seems like occasionally it reverts because I've faced this problem several times and always forget for a while that I can fix it...

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