Weird issue on flash based chat sites - unable to scroll...
I have been chatting on a couple of sites based on 123 Flash Chat software. During the last week, I have been unable to scroll in any direction while in these sites. All of the other functions in the rooms work fine. I completely nuked Flash Player and reinstalled it - the problem is still there. Does anyone know what might be causing this problem?? It is really annoying to have to use the scroll bar instead of the mouse if I miss something.
I am on a Mac Pro running OS 10.10.2. Flash Player is up to date. Firefox is version 37.0.1. I am using the same extensions that I have always used - AdBlockPlus, Facebook Purity, Classic Theme Restorer, and FlashBlock (the chat sites are in the white list for this extension).
If anyone has any ideas, your input will be greatly appreciated.
P.S. One other problem is that when I try to use a keyboard shortcut when I am in one of the two chat windows to open a new window, it does nothing. If I go to another website window, the keyboard shortcut works just fine.
Wot Brian
Wšě wotmołwy (16)
WakkoWarner, Thank you for your question. I have not experienced this yet. However there are a few troubleshooting steps we can take:
- Disable hardware acceleration in Flash
- Disable each extension one by one to see if it has to do with a combination of them
- Diagnose Firefox issues using Troubleshoot Mode
Any differences?
After the above;
Start Firefox in Safe Mode {web Link} by holding down the <Shift>
(Mac Options) key, and then starting Firefox. Is the problem still there?
The problem still occurs in Safe Mode. I have also tried refreshing Firefox, but the problem persists. I prefer to use Firefox, but I may have to look at alternatives. Howver, Chrome does not see my iSight camera (external Firewire model) - all the other browsers see it just fine.
Opera scrambles the video from the camera. Safari runs the video just fine, but it tries to scroll the main web page when I try to scroll the chat discussion.
I have also discovered that the inability to open a new web page with a keyboard shortcut is present on some sites where I am viewing a video that requires Flash Player (it does not happen on YouTube).
This problem is beyond weird and very frustrating. Everything was working just fine until about 2 weeks ago. Are there any other troubleshooting options that I can try?? Thanks for your help so far.
Check that all of your plugins are up to date.
If you have problems with current Shockwave Flash plugin versions then check this:
- see if there are updates for your graphics drive drivers
https://support.mozilla.org/kb/upgrade-graphics-drivers-use-hardware-acceleration
- disable protected mode in the Flash plugin (Flash 11.3+ on Windows Vista and later)
https://forums.adobe.com/message/4468493#TemporaryWorkaround
- disable hardware acceleration in the Flash plugin
https://forums.adobe.com/thread/891337 See also:
If there is still an issue;
Start your Computer in safe mode with networking. Then start Firefox. Try Safe web sites. Is the problem still there?
I am running OS 10.10.3 on a Mac Pro, so Windows troubleshooting will not work. I already tried disabling hardware acceleration and nothing changed. I just went into about:config and disable protected mode, but so far, nothing has changed. I personally think it is a bug in Flash Player or the current version of Firefox, but I guess it could be anything.
WakkoWarner said
Note that you may not be able to scroll when a plugin has focus. You would have to use the scroll bar to scroll or make sure that the plugin area doesn't ave focus.
On Mac the scroll bars can be hidden and only have them show when you scroll the page so you can see the current scroll position. The idea is that a touch pad is used that doesn't require the scroll bars to be visible and thus have more screen estate for the browsing area. You can make the scroll bars always visible: System Preferences > General > Show Scroll Bar > Choose "Always"
My mouse settings have been the same for years. I already had it set to show the scroll bars. This problem just cropped up out of nowhere within the past two weeks. There is no focus in the scroll area.
Has anyone been able to recreate this problem or possibly find a solution?? I have noticed that the inability to use keyboard shortcuts has been happening on other sites that are Flash based. Let me know. Thanks.
Does anyone have any ideas on this one?? The issues with not being able to use keyboard shortcuts have now extended to ANY pages that utilize Flash, so I am thinking that this is an issue with Adobe. I posted on the Flash forum, but no one seems to be able to help.
Can you scroll when the Shockwave Flash plugin isn't enabled?
You can set plugins to "Ask to Activate" on the "Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Plugins" page.
If Shockwave Flash is disabled, the chat site won't load. It requires Flash to operate.
There was an update to flash that went out last week, do you have automatic updates turned on?
I did not see a chat service named however I did find that some services like this work when you click on the other part of the window and bring it back to focus. For instance, in twitch you have to click from the video to the chat to get that section of the webpage to scroll (like an iframe or embedded text box in a webpage). However since it is using flash for this, an example like tinychat they made a shortcut button for the shortcut key that performed the action that did not work.
If it is a focus issue there is an add on called Focus regainer to override which program shortcuts it should "focus". Reference
Did this help?
Focus Regainer does nothing at all. If you want to test this on one of the sites that I have trouble with, it is www.musschat.com. I have the latest version of Flash Player on both my Mac Pro and my Macbook Pro and both machines exhibit the same issue.
I have just discovered that the inability to use keyboard shortcuts is now exhibiting itself on almost all sites that utilize Flash Player.
I may have confused what you mean by shortcut.
I tried a few of the flash player shortcuts like f11 or tabbing between things on the webpage. If parts of the interface are not working have two ideas:
- Make sure Java is up to date, and that the 32 bit version is installed since Firefox is 32bit(it really should not matter, but its worth a try)
- These were the shortcuts I tried with the player: https://helpx.adobe.com/flash/using/keyboard-shortcuts.html but it looks like that you can edit them, is it possible that they were removed? (I only ask since they do not work for other sites as well)
Everything is up to date on my machines. The keyboard shortcuts I am talking about are like using command-n to open a new window. None of them will work on a site utilizing Flash Player. It truly wish that Flash Player would just disappear forever and everyone would switch to HTML5.