[Mac?] Determinate google searches trigger Spotify to start unexpectedly

[shatteringlass]

Description

Searching Google for "spotify elapsed hours" (without quotes) causes Spotify client to start and play music from where it was previously paused.

A more detailed description, using numbered steps

1. Search google for "spotify elapsed hours";

2. Wait for Spotify client to start up

3. Enjoy unexpected good music

What I expected to happen

I do have SpotifyWebHelper running (shows up in Activity Monitor as running) and I expect this to be used to run the client when clicking on actual links to playlists.

What actually happened

Client starts unexpectedly. Turning web-start off solves this. Maybe this means that spotifywebhelper actually is a keylogger/spyware that reads every input to our keyboard/browser? I mean, how can the client be triggered by a simple google search?

My Operating System

OS X 10.8.2

My Spotify version

Latest

My internet provider and country

By no means interesting

My username

shatteringlass

Do you have any screenshots you can attach to more clearly explain your issue?

Don't.

[Peter__]

Hey! Welcome to the community 🙂 

That does sound very strange, just tried this out and I am unable to replicate this on Windows or Linux.

Have you tried a clean reinstallation of the client to see if this goes away?

Peter

[shatteringlass]

Actually I am going to try this on Windows 8 and Ubuntu 13.04 immediately and report here.

Thanks for your welcome.

[Peter__]

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@shatteringlass wrote:

Actually I am going to try this on Windows 8 and Ubuntu 13.04 immediately and report here.

Thanks for your welcome.

---

Okay 🙂 

Would you also be able to post your Spotify client version, its in the Help > About menu? "Latest" is a little vague since we are currently in a transition period between two client versions meaning latest depends on if you have been pushed to the new one yet.

Peter

[shatteringlass]

Ok on Ubuntu I am running 0.8.8.323.gd143501e and it does not appear to have an option for web-start (no webhelper daemon). Therefore, google searches can't trigger the client. Going to boot W8 and report more.

[Peter__]

Ah, I forgot to check if it actually had web start on Ubuntu! Good catch 😛 

Windows definitely does though! 

Peter

[shatteringlass]

Ok, Windows 8 has webhelper running (client v. 0.8.5.etcetera)  but the search seems to trigger nothing from Chrome nor Opera Next. I don't have IE10 so can't comment on that, but there's no reason for it to act different. 

I'm going back to my Mac, reboot it, try again with currently installed version and report. Then I will update, if any update is available, and test again. 

[shatteringlass]

I'm here with a solution.

what really triggers spotify to start on my mac is a google search which features a playlist as first result. the terms "spotify elapsed hours" triggered this playlist, but my post has replaced it as the first result. Try and search a playlist in google: you will find that the first result will start in spotify even if unrequired. 

I am experiencing this on Mac OS X, client version is 0.8.5.1333.g822e0de8. I haven't tried on W8 yet.

[Liam]

I'm afraid it doesn't do that on Windows 😛

[shatteringlass]

I might agree with you. This seems to be a browser issue: on my mac, neither Safari nor Firefox are affected. Only Google Chrome (25.0.1364.152) does this. 

[StevenR · Accepted solution]

I recently experienced the same issue. I found that it was due to the setting "Predict network actions to improve page load performance" under Privacy (you need the advanced settings displayed to see this setting) in Google Chrome.

This setting causes Chrome to predict the links you are going to click on and open the pages in the background to improve performance. Since you are likely to click the first link in Google search results, this will usually be preloaded. If this link happens to be to a Spotify playlist, then Spotify will open that playlist. At least it does on my Mac.

After disabling the setting it no longer happens.