User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:109.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/112.0

Steps to reproduce:

1. Open normal browsing session
2. Enable "Open previous windows and tabs" option under Settings/General/Startup
3. Open any number of tabs with random websites
4. Open private browsing session.
5. Close the normal browsing session

Actual results:

Previous normal browsing session is not restored. Firefox started with only one new tab.

Expected results:

Previous normal browsing session should have been restored. Firefox should have started with the previous windows and tabs.

The Bugbug bot thinks this bug should belong to the 'Firefox::Session Restore' component, and is moving the bug to that component. Please correct in case you think the bot is wrong.

Hi @Seffe I tried to reproduce this issue on our side but Firefox restores the Normal window without issues, Are you Closing Firefox from the Hamburger menu or simply closing the normal browsing window from the X Close button and then the Private Window ?

Could you try to reproduce this issue in our latest Nightly build ? you can find it here: https://nightly.mozilla.org/

This will also create a fresh profile specifically for the Nightly build and you'd have to check the Open previous windows and tabs in about:preferences again.
Please let us know if it still occurs.
If it doesnt occur it means that maybe you might have some Addons or maybe some other preferences changed that is causing this issue.

(In reply to Rares Doghi, Desktop QA from comment #2)

Hi @Seffe I tried to reproduce this issue on our side but Firefox restores the Normal window without issues, Are you Closing Firefox from the Hamburger menu or simply closing the normal browsing window from the X Close button and then the Private Window ?

Hi @Rares Doghi. I have tried different ways to close. Alt + F4 and X button on top right behaves as I've stated. Problem doesn't happen with the hamburger menu exit option (Ctrl + Shift + Q) because it also closes the private session. My steps to reproduce section doesn't include closing the private session. The order of opening between the normal session and the private session doesn't matter, but private session must stay open while closing and re-opening the normal session. Do not close the private session.

Could you try to reproduce this issue in our latest Nightly build ? you can find it here.
This will also create a fresh profile specifically for the Nightly build and you'd have to check the Open previous windows and tabs in about:preferences again.
Please let us know if it still occurs.

I have just installed the Nightly build, and followed the steps I have listed on description. Nightly build was clean, I haven't done anything but install and the reproduction steps. It behaves the same. The bug persists.

I think I understand now, I grabbed a screen recording of the issue, but I do believe this is the intended behavior, as long as the Private window is opened it will still be the same session and unless you close Firefox completely you can only restore closed windows from History.
I will open this issue and maybe one of our devs can take a look and explain it a bit better.

@Seffe did it work differently on your end in the past ? because for me even in older builds I still get the same behaviour.

I will attach the screen recording in case it helps.

(In reply to Rares Doghi, Desktop QA from comment #4)

I do believe this is the intended behavior, as long as the Private window is opened it will still be the same session and unless you close Firefox completely you can only restore closed windows from History.

I still consider this as a problem because history doesn't have an option to list the visited links by the time the tabs were last closed. So if I have opened a tab and kept it for a while, then used other tabs for other tasks, and closed them, in history I lose track of the tabs I kept open. It is worse when I kept a tab open for a long while without visiting the tabs, which is for me something that happens a lot. Session restore usually lets me keep tabs for months without visiting them. So, when I forget that I also have private session on, I lose those tabs. Doing Ctrl + Shift + T doesn't bring the tabs back either. So, I can't access the last tabs anywhere. History is close to useless for that case, because restoring tabs on next start doesn't make the tabs jump on top in history.

I don't get any notifications or warnings when I close the normal session when there is an open private session, and since I am used to keeping the tabs when I close a normal session, I don't remember checking if the private session is on or not. I believe the option I checked doesn't imply anywhere that the private session interferes with the session restore. It is even less obvious when I consider that private session has a separate taskbar icon for all of its instances.

@Seffe did it work differently on your end in the past ? because for me even in older builds I still get the same behaviour.

I haven't been using the private session as heavily as I do now. I haven't noticed it until it made me lose my tabs. Probably it was always the case.

I will open this issue and maybe one of our devs can take a look and explain it a bit better.

Thanks.

(In reply to Rares Doghi, Desktop QA from comment #4)

as long as the Private window is opened it will still be the same session

Even if it's the same session, I had some tabs in the previous session, which is supposed to be restored.
I have tried something to test this idea, and I think it makes no sense.
First, let me note down what I did.
Steps to reproduce:

1. Start firefox in normal mode.
2. Open some tabs. (Make sure the restoring option is enabled.)
3. Close normal session.
4. Open private session.
5. Open normal session. Observe that restoring works fine.
6. Close normal session.
7. Open normal session. Observe that nothing is restored. (In reply to Rares Doghi, Desktop QA from comment #4)

Following your idea, after step 3, session #1 has ended.
Step 4 started session #2.
Step 5 and 7 should work the same way (in terms of restoring) because they will either be in the same session because of the private window that was open, which would make them both restore from session #1.
OR maybe starting with private window works differently, and they will both be separate sessions. In that case, step 5 would create session #3, which would either fail restoring because of session #2 (which is incorrect because restoring works if I opened a private-only session between normal sessions.), or restore from session #1. And step 7 would restore from session #3 created at step 5, which doesn't work.

I don't understand the reason behind the difference of restoring in step 5 and step 7.
I also don't understand why my years of session restoring data can be completely ignored if I forget a private window open. Like, there are hundreds of previous sessions which are not only ignored, but also completely unavailable to restore.

I have found a workaround!

Let's say you have closed a normal session, and there was a private session open. Then you have opened a normal session again, and it didn't show any of the tabs that were open.

The solution is, Ctrl + N. When the focus is on the new normal session, Ctrl + N opens another new normal session with all the tabs restored. (I actually did Ctrl + Shift + N, I was trying to remember another shortcut, but I guess Shift doesn't do anything.) Idk why it works, and Idk what happens when there are multiple normal sessions. But, it works for my case.

Idk how to properly resolve it since it's just a workaround, but I don't plan on visiting this website until there is another problem. Feel free to mark it resolved.

Have a nice day :)

(In reply to Seffe[:Seffe] from comment #8)

The solution is, Ctrl + N. When the focus is on the new normal session, Ctrl + N opens another new normal session with all the tabs restored. (I actually did Ctrl + Shift + N, I was trying to remember another shortcut, but I guess Shift doesn't do anything.) Idk why it works, and Idk what happens when there are multiple normal sessions. But, it works for my case.

It works with Ctrl + Shift + N.
Ctrl + N always opens a blank new window.

(In reply to Seffe[:Seffe] from comment #9)

(In reply to Seffe[:Seffe] from comment #8)

The solution is, Ctrl + N. When the focus is on the new normal session, Ctrl + N opens another new normal session with all the tabs restored. (I actually did Ctrl + Shift + N, I was trying to remember another shortcut, but I guess Shift doesn't do anything.) Idk why it works, and Idk what happens when there are multiple normal sessions. But, it works for my case.

It works with Ctrl + Shift + N.
Ctrl + N always opens a blank new window.

Oh yeah, that saved my day.

I still think that is an issue, I always leave my tabs open, sometimes I have a incognito window open but usual behaviour is just turning off the computer (OR folding MacBook, happens the same)... And then you return, you would expect that your "normal" session is restored, just, of course, the incognito is gone. Its also not helpful that there is not even the "restore session" button is there.
If firefox closes down it should first close the incognito window-session and then the normal, in that way, it should be able to restore the normal window, no? From a user point of view this is definatly broken