No title bar in Chrome

[C]

I have two web sites that in reality are two branches of the same project. However, in the newer one, I'm getting a RadWindow problem that wasn't originally there.

For instance, when comparing this one page in the two versions, every single row in every single involved file is the same (save a few removed commented rows). Furthermore, both sites' projects use the same versions of Telerik dll:s. And yet, in one of these sites, the title bar (including the border all around the window) does not show up.

I have read this guide: http://www.telerik.com/help/aspnet-ajax/window-troubleshooting-missing-borders-titlebar-and-commands.html and condluded the following:

• This only happens in Chrome (well, on occasion it has happened in IE10 too, but I haven't been able to replicate that error).
• EnableEmbeddedSkins is set to True
• I get no error 500

How can I best start to debug this?

(As a bonus piece of information: RadWindows opened from within other RadWindows do not have this problem)

[Marin Bratanov]

Hi,

This is a really odd behavior that you are experiencing. Can you check whether the background images that create the borders are received property in the browser? It is possible that, for some reason, Chrome does not properly parse these requests. You can check for them in the dev toolbar and request the file (see the short video that is attached here).

The other things I can suggest you can try are:
- recycle IIS, clear ASP and browser caches. It is possible that some cache is returning invalid data.
- a different skin. It may be possible that a concrete skin has this issue, and others do not. You can set a global skin in the web.config for your RadWindows (see the last section here).
- using the RadStyleSheetManager: http://www.telerik.com/help/aspnet-ajax/stylesheetmanager.html.
- using its Skins CDN: http://www.telerik.com/help/aspnet-ajax/stylesheetmanager-cdn-support.html.
- using the Lightweight RenderMode RadWindow offers, because it relies on less images sprites: http://www.telerik.com/help/aspnet-ajax/window-render-modes.html.
- looking for differences in the deployment scenario, especially if the applications are hosted on different servers. Proxies, firewalls or other software may be tampering with requests and/or URLs.

Regards,
Marin Bratanov
Telerik

[Richard]

Marin, did you ever find a true cause to this problem?   Something similar is happening to me.   The RadWindow title bar simply stops displaying for the Chrome browser.  It seems to be cache related as it does not appear right away but only after some days or weeks of use.

Thank you.

[Marin Bratanov]

Hello Richard,

I am sorry to say that I have no further information on this. It is not an issue I have ever seen, or have a logical explanation for.

What I can offer at this point, apart from my original ideas is to try toggling some properties like EnableShadow because it causes the control to use different sprites in Classic RnederMode, so if the issue is with the images alone - loading the different sprites may alleviate it. You may lose the shadow but that would be the lesser evil.

Also, I have strong hopes for the LightWeight render mode because it uses virtually no images (only the command buttons and the icon are images) so the issue should not manifest if it is related to images.


Regards,

Marin Bratanov
Telerik

 

 

[Richard]

In my case, the problem is inconsistent.   No changes in code but users (including myself) will find a title bar on day 1 but not on day 3 (for example).    I've been using this same basic site for several years but this problem has only started to occur within the past few months.
What I've tried:
Recycle IIS (empty .net and browser cache):   Emptying browser cache seems to help for a short time.
Light Weight Render Mode (applied via web.config): No change in behavior
Using RadStyleSheetManager:  Always have..... 
Using Skins CDN:    I'll try this but this site is rather small and caters to an intranet audience.   
Different Skin (applied via web.config):  Switched from Black to Windows7.    Unsure if it helped to gain an relief for some users.  I stopped seeing the problem for a few days.      I'll open a ticket, I guess.

[Marin Bratanov]

Hi Richard,

This issue is really odd and I am not aware of reasons for such behavior. My best guess at this point is some incorrect caching that could, potentially, be caused by some proxy, or requests being blocked by a firewall or other similar software (on the server, or on the user machine).

What makes it even stranger is that this manifests with Lightweight render mode - it does not use so many background images, so a missing titlebar would mean missing stylesheets, which indicates some issue with the browser cache or with the webresource urls (for the former there isn't much we can do, for the latter you can see if there are broken requests in the dev toolbar and switch to the CDN if the ideas from this article do not help).

On CDN + intranet - it is possible to create a custom provider on an appropriate server in the intranet as described here. The article treats scripts CDN but the approach for the skins CDN is identical.

If there are additional details you can provide in a ticket - you can open one, but with the same set of information I doubt we will be able to provide a much different answer.


Regards,

Marin Bratanov
Telerik

 

 

[Richard]

Problem was also just seen in Firefox version 31 but I believe that we may have a fix.    No way to tell other than wait a few days as the problem as not reproducible upon demand.   I will update this post early next week.

This site uses a master template.   I:
1.  Came across the problem in Firefox
2.  Without leaving the site, edited the master ASPX file and deleted          <telerik:RadFormDecorator ... />
3.  Refreshed the page and all worked as expected.

[Marin Bratanov]

Hi Richard,

It would be rather odd that this would be the fix or cause for this behavior. Nevertheless, I hope it will work for you.

Perhaps RadFormDecorator has applied some styles to the RadWindow elements (its title is a h6 and its commants are button elements) even though this should not happen. So, another workarounds could be:

• setting ControlsToSkip="H4H5H6, Buttons" so those elements are avoided
• using a decoration zone under the form - a simple div with an id will suffice. RadWindow will render its popup element outside of this zone so the styles may not be applied to it.

Those are still shots in the dark because I am not aware of reasons for such integartion issue, yet you can give them a try because they can let you keep the form decorator if you need it.

Regards,

Marin Bratanov
Telerik

 

 

[Richard]

The problem has not recurred RadDecorator was removed.     There are no plans to reintroduce RadDecorator and "tinker" with the settings as the problem it introduced was not worth the tool's benefit.

Thank you.