Browser.backspace action

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The title given to this article is incorrect due to technical limitations. The correct title is browser.backspace_action.

This article describes the preference browser.backspace_action. To add, delete, or modify this preference, you will need to edit your configuration — do not edit this article.

Background

The backspace key was mapped to the browser ‘Back’ function in Mozilla for consistency with Internet Explorer. However, to improve consistency with other applications running on Linux, it was decided that this mapping should be optional—and set based on which platform the browser was running on. As a compromise, this preference was created to allow the backspace key to either go back/forward, scroll up/down a page, or do nothing.

Possible values and their effects

0

Pressing [Backspace] will go back a page in the session history and [Shift]+[Backspace] will go forward. (Default in Windows)

1

Pressing [Backspace] will scroll up a page in the current document and [Shift]+[Backspace] will scroll down. (Default in Linux builds before 2006-12-07)

(Other)

Any other integer value will simply unmap the backspace key. In Linux builds after 2006-12-07, the default is 2.

Caveats

  • Camino does not implement any behavior for the value 1; if the preference is set to that value, the backspace key is unmapped.

First checked in

Mozilla Suite/SeaMonkey
2005-01-28 by Chris Thomas
Mozilla Firefox
2005-10-20 by Asaf Romano
Camino
2006-03-01 by Håkan Waara

Has an effect in

  • Firefox (all trunk builds since 2005-10-20; 2.0 and later)
  • SeaMonkey (all builds since 2005-01-28)
  • Camino (all builds since 2006-03-01)

Related bugs

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