Unable to view destinations on Bing Maps

[sleddriver]

Very, very weird. First, I'm using WXP Pro SP 3 & FF 3.6.22. I run AdblockPlus, ZoneAlarm & NoScript 2.1.2.7.

When I search for ANY destination with Bing Maps, the map page will open, I'll see the map quickly appear, then disappear to a white screen. On the left side, the destination will appear with its address & number, etc. But NO MAP.

After messing with the FF plug-ins above, I disabled the three above. Furthermore, I've allowed all cookies, all 3rd party cookies, pop-ups, javascript is enabled, I downloaded SilverLight (thinking it was necessary), gone through Tools > Options... looking for anything that might be blocking the destination map. No joy.

HOWEVER

When I go to Bing Maps homepage, I see the US map on the right side fine. I can zoom in, centered on my location, I can grab the map with the palm tool and move it around. No problems. However, when I type a destination into the search bar on the Bing Maps page, it opens a page with links showing the destination and it's location on a small map. I click on the map, new page opens up, I see it quickly appear, then it disappears. Go figure....

When I go to Tools > Page Info > Media I can see all the map tiles and scroll through them. Here's one of them: http://ecn.t3.tiles.virtualearth.net/til...ng=hill&n=z

Here's one of the Map tool images: http://sc1.maps.live.com/i/bin/20110907.1808/vecss_en.png

So the info is being dwnld'd, but for some reason FF isn't displaying it or is being prohibited from displaying it...except for a split-second.

Tools > Java Console shows nothing.

Tools > Error Console shows nothing under 'errors' or 'messages', but 'warnings' is going nuts! It says "Error in parsing value for 'height'. Declaration dropped" Right below it the same thing occurs except height is replaced with 'width'....and it's wiggling...vibrating...like it's overflowing an error Q or something. I click 'clear' and it stops for a few seconds, I see the scroll bar on the right side quickly shrink in height, then it starts the wiggling thing again. Here's the link that repeatedly appears: https://support.discoverbing.com/default.aspx?st=1&website=bing&tenant=oss&brand=bing&as=1&timestmp=634524830049973560&acty=ProductList&ctl=oss%2fcontent%2fbing_support_home&wf=OSS&trl=OSS%7eProductList&c=oss_bing&ln=en-us&productKey=binglocal&sub=free
Line: 0

When I close the Bing Maps tab in FF, the error console warning is still overflowing like it's stuck in an infinite loop.

When I paste the above into the 'Code:' box in Error Console, click 'warnings' and click 'evaluate' it says "missing before statement" for about 2 sec, then the msg disappears.

Perhaps it's attempting to display the map in a box with height & width undefined, or zero or unreadable.

Anyone else have a problem with FF 3.6.22 and Bing Maps? Anyone have a clue what's going on here?

 

[sleddriver]

It seems I had another Bing window open that caused the error console overflow. I closed all windows, cleared the warnings and opened only the bing map window. This time I received numerous warnings in error console:
Error in parsing value for 'filter'. Declaration dropped.
And others too numerous to list. They all have to do with Bing & sc1.maps.live.com. Mostly the later. Reading through the xhtml code, I saw several mentions of

 

[sleddriver]

Well more investigation has revealed that bing map images are from Kumo Maps which are part of Microsoft. http://sc1.maps.live.com/ takes you to a page that looks a lot like Bing Maps, except it's blue instead of orange. When I type in a destination here though, IT WORKS! Nice big map and everything. Evidently Kumo is part of MS Live? whatever that is.

Sounds like the bottleneck has something to do with Bing at this point....

 

[sleddriver]

I thought this was such a quirky thing, I didn't bother searching on-line in the Mozilla forum for it. My mistake. I should have! Found this.

FF does have a 'safe-mode' which disables plug-ins, themes, & add-ons to quickly determine if they are at fault. However, this didn't work in my situation. Safe Mode.

Next, I created a new profile and booted FF. This time I WAS able to view bing maps. New Profile.

Found this interesting reading:

Short: Open "about:config", go to preference "dom.storage.enable" and reset or double click to "true".

However, read below and do your own searches for privacy issues.

Long: If you are on this page you probably went looking for an answer and found that Bing just changed its site http://www.bing.com/community/blogs/m.../bing-s-bringing-sexy-maps.aspx. They are now using dom.storage which is "a mechanism allowing web pages to store information with a web browser (similar to cookies) called “client-side session and persistent storage.” Although use of session storage is subject to a user’s cookie preferences, this preference allows it to be disabled entirely" http://kb.mozillazine.org/Dom.storage.enabled. You can set the default value, which is presently 5201 (5Mb) with the preference "dom.storage.default_quota" http://kb.mozillazine.org/Dom.storage.default_quota.

DOM Storage - DOM storage allows web sites to store information in a persistent manner on your computer, much like cookies but with greater capacity and efficiency. Some articles call the items supercookies. However, I disagree. I had the preference set to false, meaning theoretically nothing should be loaded and supercookies, LSO's, were still being found after the fact with the Better Privacy add on. This is something different.

Back in 2006 it was discussed that it was a bug (link not provided, hey, it was 2006) because if the cookies setting was set to block, then this info should be blocked too, otherwise an unscrupulous website could just circumvent cookies by using this storage. And, since you cannot limit its use to specific sites, you must disable it (set it to false) or find other security. I could not find why the ultimate resolution (to enable the storage) was reached, but the description of the preference seems to say it all, that is, they did not fix it because it "allows {the cookie preferences} to be disabled entirely". Not very comforting.

Once I found the offending preference, I searched it to see if others had a problem. Here, http://www.google.com/support/forum/p.../thread?tid=409d8ad649e1ef4e&hl=en it is a problem with google images. I had the same problem and do not now. The pages scroll and are properly paginated. As for the privacy issue, at least with the google site it was not entirely inoperable AND there was an alternative (a link to switch to the basic version).

This link http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20186386-DOM-Storage-a-browser-priv... has a post by SUMware that addresses this:

"Understand your concerns.

The following will not alleviate all privacy issues, but there are two 'lesser known' Firefox addons that attempt to limit information leakage.

SafeCache is a Mozilla Firefox browser extension that protects your privacy by silently defending against cache-based tracking techniques. It allows embedded content to be cached, but segments the cache according to the domain of the originating page.

SafeHistory is a Mozilla Firefox browser extension that protects your privacy by silently defending against visited-link-based tracking techniques. It allows offsite visited links to be marked only if the browser's history database contains a record of the link being followed from the current site.

In light of this info, I'm not sure I want to enable this. Flash tracking cookies are bad enough. Now here's a version of a browser 'super-cookie' that can look through your cache and history if enabled.

 

[sleddriver]

Received this info from Bing customer service. Rather amazing what they wanted you to turn on.

Quote:
Thank you for writing to Bing Technical Support. My name is Donna and I am glad to assist you today.

It is my understanding that you're getting a white blank page when clicking on a map after performing a search through Bing. It's possible that the problem is caused by incorrect browser settings. I know that you've already performed come steps to resolve the problem. However, please check if there are some steps missed from these suggested fixes below:

1. Type "about:config" (without quotes) in the browser's location bar.
2. Typed "image" (without quotes) in the Filter field
3. Ensure that "dom.disable_image_src_set" is set to TRUE

Follow these steps to optimize your browser settings.

A. Connection settings:
1. Click "General".
2. Click the "Connection Settings" button.
3. Click "Direct connection to the Internet", and then click "OK".

B. Privacy settings:

1. Click "Privacy".
2. Click the "Cache" tab.
3. Click "Clear Cache Now".
4. Click the "Cookies" tab.
5. Click "Clear Cookies Now".

C. Allowed sites:

1. Click "Content".
2. Next to "Block Popup Windows", click "Allowed Sites".
3. In the text box, type "msn.com", and then click "Allow".
4. Repeat step 3 for the following domains

· hotmail.com
· passport.com
· live.com
· my.msn.com

5. Click "Close".


D. Secure browsing:

1. Click "Advanced".
2. Click the "Security" tab.
3. Make sure that the following check boxes are selected:

· "Use SSL 2.0"
· "Use SSL 3.0"
· "Use TSL 1.0"

4. Make sure that "Select one automatically" is selected.

5. Click "OK".

If you have the Firefox addon Adblock installed you must also follow these steps:

1. In Firefox press the following keys at the same time CTRL+SHIFT+A to open the Adblock preferences window.
2. Click "Add filter".
3. Type "@@live.com" (without quotation marks) and press ENTER.
4. Repeat step three with the following site names

· "@@msn.com"
· "@@hotmail.com"
· "@@passport.com"
· "@@msads.net"
· "@@atdmt.com"

5. Click "OK".

I hope this information helps. Let us know if you encounter some problems or if the issue remains unresolved.

We appreciate your continued support as we strive to provide you with the highest quality service available. Thank you for using Bing Maps.

 

[Garak]

Originally Posted By: sleddriver
Received this info from Bing customer service. Rather amazing what they wanted you to turn on.


Oh my. That's a pretty involved procedure for getting it working. Maybe they should add to their FAQ that zooming into an ocean area in full screen mode is really not the BSOD.

 

[sleddriver]

Yea...and after all that, Bing Maps STILL didn't work! Go figure.... Evidently, my FF profile is protecting me from Bing. . . perhaps that's a good thing!