Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Symantec

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aquais
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Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by aquais »

Chetan67 wrote:
James wrote:
Chetan67 wrote:Latest version of SEP supports Mozilla Firefox from 3.6 - 28.0
So it is rather behind. Firefox 28.0 came out back on March 18, 2014.
Sorry that was not accurate. As per release notes 5.x through 47.0 is supported with the latest version.
SEP system requirements guide: https://support.symantec.com/en_US/arti ... 31877.html
I have reviewed this article and downgraded our Firefox to 47.0 but still the same problem exists. The only reason I have been updating (aside from it being good practice) was in hopes that any updates might help resolve the download problem. I have also been in touch with a member of the Symantec Escalation team. I will be working with them. Thank you for bringing this to their attention.
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therube
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Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by therube »

Are you using a fixed download directory or do you have it set to always ask?
In any case, switch to the other & test & see if that makes any difference.

Might also "immediately" accept the download dialog & then also pause & wait, say for 10 seconds, again seeing if there is any difference.

I'll assume that if you use an (external) download manager, with the download initiated from FF, that the download succeeds?

But then:
I have tried using a download manager
Which? And how does it "interface" with FF?
Extension, "drop zone" where you can drag a link to it, via FlashGot?
If you simply paste the link into the download manager (& in doing so, bypassing FF entirely)... ?

Might throw in Process Monitor & see if that might catch whatever might be going on.
some files don't work
URLs to the particular failures?
Some sites will require JavaScript & possibly further an acknowledgement of some sort, before the actual download link gets "sent".
in our VM environment
What VM?
And does that also mean that testing outside of the VM does succeed?


Anything of note recorded in Error Console?
Fire 750, bring back 250.
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.19) Gecko/20110420 SeaMonkey/2.0.14 Pinball CopyURL+ FetchTextURL FlashGot NoScript
aquais
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Joined: July 27th, 2016, 3:22 pm

Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by aquais »

therube - let me try to break out your questions and answer them as specifically as possibly.

1.
therube wrote:Are you using a fixed download directory or do you have it set to always ask?

Answer - I have tried both methods. Our default configuration is to set FF download directly to the downloads folder that is for the Users profile. However for testing I have changed to "always ask" and made sure I selected other locations. Examples of other locations include Network Shares, the root of the virtual machine C:\, or USB drives plugged into the physical machine. Each test results in the same behavior.

I have not "waited" 10 seconds or so to download a file after clicking download. I can see this being an interesting test case, but there is no way I could convince every patron of our university to wait.

2.
therube wrote:I'll assume that if you use an (external) download manager, with the download initiated from FF, that the download succeeds?

Answer - By default we are not using a download manger. In fact by default we are not even allowing any add-ons in our student computer builds. For testing purpose I was using Download Manager S3 (https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2014/04 ... d-add-ons/) it was important that I find something current and it was pick of the month back in April. It interfaced very nicely with FF but didn't seem to resolve the issue either. I do like the look and feel of it and I have suggest we consider adding this to our default student build template. It basically adds a lot more information to the downloads window and include great tools such as checksum, but it may give our normal patrons/students too much information and overwhelm them. I have not tried Drop Zone, but I will look into that and see how it performs. Process Manager has been extremely helpful in identify that Symantec was kicking off when the downloads were attempting to finalize and copy to the machine.

3.
URLs to the particular failures?

Answer - So this problem is only with EXE files. The file size doesn't matter, but it does seem very specific to EXE files. My testing download sites have been Java.com, malwarebytes.com, notepad-plus-plus.org, and Webex.com. In the case of using Java.com I will go to this site and attempt to download the Windows Offline exe file and see the result. More often that it will fail and the file will report zero bytes.

4.
What VM? And does that also mean that testing outside of the VM does succeed?

Answer - Any Virtual Machine that we build seems to suffer from this problem. In troubleshooting this from a VMware side I have gone over many things. There is a noted issue with Endpoint filter service causing problems. I have made sure that is turned off on our Gold image. In our campus we really don't have any physical machines. All of our machines have a linux client that boots into VMware Horizon Client and then our patrons select the build of their need. For example we have Academic, Science, Staff, Kiosk, Library builds. A normal student will sit down at workstation, select Academic, and then load up a non-persistent machine. I have rebuilt our gold image, rebuilt each application package, and attempted to isolate the root cause. So far all signs seem to point towards Symantec as I can disable this service and watch exe file downloads complete without problems.

Thank you for this well thought-out post! My goal in posting here was to gain another insight into this issue and possibly discover other things I could try while I attempt to work with Symantec on this matter.
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Grumpus
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Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by Grumpus »

Could Symantec used something like a Windows registry hack in their process to prevent the files load or activation?
Is it possible your VM system during loading or copying picked up on a registry hack somewhere?
Doesn't matter what you say, it's wrong for a toaster to walk around the house and talk to you
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therube
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Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by therube »

I was using Download Manager S3
That is an extension, so most likely ? only relying upon FF own services for the download, so if downloading direct in FF fails, you'd expect it to also fail using that extension.

I was thinking of a third-party, external download manager, that might or might not have a direct interface (by extension or otherwise) to FF, or could be interfaced by "proxy" (if you will) with FlashGot.

Likewise "Drop Zone" is not a download manager, but a feature offered by download managers, providing a "box" where you can drag a link into, initiating a download.

So from (for instance) here, http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/seamonkey/ni ... comm-beta/, you could drag any file into this (external download manager's) "drop zone" to initiate the download through the (external) download manger - bypassing the browser entirely.

Likewise if the particular download manager can interface with FlashGot, you can pass the link(s) (by way of FlashGot) to a download manger.

I have not "waited" 10 seconds or so to download a file after clicking download. I can see this being an interesting test case, but there is no way I could convince every patron of our university to wait.
It's not about convincing others, its about testing (on your end) to see if it is possibly a timing related (for whatever reason) issue.
Fire 750, bring back 250.
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1.19) Gecko/20110420 SeaMonkey/2.0.14 Pinball CopyURL+ FetchTextURL FlashGot NoScript
aquais
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Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by aquais »

It's not about convincing others, its about testing (on your end) to see if it is possibly a timing related (for whatever reason) issue.
This is a good point. I had just jumped the gun here a little bit to say that if it was a timing issue then how do I go about making this time of change. I will do some testing and let you know what I find.
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Grumpus
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Re: Firefox unable to download files consistantly with Syman

Post by Grumpus »

@aquais - My remark on the windows hack came from a site I read on stopping exe files from loading and/or running.
It seemed to make sense if something in your setup essentially created the same kind of change in the registry.
Doesn't matter what you say, it's wrong for a toaster to walk around the house and talk to you
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