Webviews are killed too aggressively

[kugiigi]

Steps to reproduce

1. Open a few webapps
2. Open morph and load a few tabs
3. Browse and switch between tabs and webapps for some time

Expected Results

Tabs and webapps continue to work and only be killed and reloaded when there's no enough free memory

Actual Results

Some tabs and/or webapps gets killled and becomes just white. This even happens in the current tab and refreshing the page just crashes the webview again after a few moments of loading the web page. This seems to happen even if there's enough free memory.

[gbdomubpkm]

I can only confirm this about the Volla UT
HelloVolla/ubuntu-touch-beta-tests#101
Very annoying and prevents from exploiting the potential of this good smartphone.

[UniversalSuperBox]

I suspect that there is a memory leak inside either QtWebEngine or Morph causing this effect. Watch the memory usage on a device with a webpage loading ads and you'll see it never goes down.

[kugiigi]

A worst case of this issue happened again on my tablet. I opened and closed a few Libreoffice apps for some time then when I tried to go back to my webapps and Morph,webviews can't survive 5 seconds anymore. They just keep on getting killed. And it seems top and htop show normal memory usage. Not sure if this is replicable on other devices though.

[gbdomubpkm]

With the Volla, an example to reproduce with only 3 elements open at the same time:

• Dekko reading an email in the inbox
• webapp Deepl Translator Jose M Reyes
• webapp webber with link
  https://fr.tennistemple.com/

Switching from dekko to a webapp does not kill the webapp but switching from one webapp to another systematically kills the latter immediately...
Dekko is never killed (fortunately !!!).

Closing dekko completely and switching from one webapp to another kills it again. Then switching from one webapp to another is done without killing any of them.

[ruedigerkupper]

Confirming that as a common problem with webapp-container. I launch the web app and it works fine, I leave it open to have it „at my fingertips“ the naxt days (Canonicals's old marketing slogan revived ;-)). But returning the next day, the web app just shows a plain white screen with nothing to do about. Quite dissapointing ;-:)
A quick fix for a start might be implementing #501, a reload-option for webapp-container. In the lobg run, webapps should just keep working, like other apps.

[kugiigi]

Interestingly, web browsing is a lot stable on my bq E5 and MX4 (limited testing). My app Pesbuk's webview, has never crashed so far. The app may be killed but not just the webview. I can continiuosly browse and switch tabs and I rarely get webview crashes. I got it on kickstarter once and a bit more frequent on twitter but closing Pesbuk, seem to improve the situation.On my Xperia X and Lenovo tablet, once this happens, webviews crash frantically to a point it's barely usable. I reboot or restart Lomiri to fix this.
What's more interesting is I get this screen on my bq E5 whenever the webview crash on morph. I never got this on my Xperia X and Lenovo tablet

[gbdomubpkm]

@UniversalSuperBox Please try to prioritize the UT memory leaks issue for as soon as possible. Quite disabling and limiting all the same. I find that this has not improved with OTA-18.. Thank you very much in advance for considering this.

[UniversalSuperBox]

Hi @gbdomubpkm, thanks for your interest.

I'm currently buried under a large amount of work for OTA-19, Ubuntu Touch based on 20.04, administration for the UBports Foundation, and other clients. I simply do not have the time to spare to look at any more things than I am currently looking at. I would appreciate any insight you have into this issue, and I would appreciate if you tested https://gitlab.com/ubports/core/packaging/qtwebengine/-/merge_requests/5 (sudo ubports-qa install PR_qtwebengine_5) and reported your testing results there.

I appreciate your interest, but asking me to change my priorities is unlikely to do any good for your cause. I'm doing what I'm doing for a reason, not just "because I want to." I understand that this issue is frustrating for you, but I'm simply not able to dedicate more of my life than I already do to Ubuntu Touch.

Thanks for your understanding, and let me know how the QtWebEngine 5.15 testing goes for you.

[gbdomubpkm]

@UniversalSuperBox I apologize for not being precise enough in my words: I understand well the ton of work you have in all directions and I was not talking about OTA-19 because I am very well that everything is already ''planned'', but to study the possibility to take into account this problem for AFTER OTA-19. That's why I was pointing out, a little bit, this problem in advance.

[gbdomubpkm]

I did a try about 3 weeks ago on RC and installating PR_qtwebengine_5 did not solve the problem and did not reduce it for me. I would even say that the problem manifested itself more frequently.

[gbdomubpkm]

The problem is still at least as prevalent with OTA-20. (Volla).

Edit 18/12 : I had to reflash for some my Volla several times with the Wipe option for some reasons and it didn't change the problem.