[tor-dev] How to best support tor 0.2.3.x in Tor Browser Bundle?

[Mike Perry]

Thus spake Erinn Clark (erinn at torproject.org):

> * Mike Perry <mikeperry at torproject.org> [2012:07:31 14:56 -0700]: 
> > Quick recap from #tor-dev IRC convo with Nick, Roger, and Andrew:
> > 
> > We need to get a usable tor 0.2.3.x-rc bundle out RSN so we can declare
> > it "stable", but there are concerns that using Firefox 14 with this will
> > continue to cause unexpected problems and otherwise scare people away
> > from testing tor 0.2.3.x enough.
> 
> How unstable is Firefox 14 though? It is Firefox's stable release, after all.
> Are the recently-released bundles unusable?

Unclear, but probably OK now? I had to rewrite my pipelining patch at
the last minute due to massive changes in the Firefox 14 pipelining
code. That rewrite introduced the crash bug. Once fixed, my test Firefox
build behaved fine for a while. I will switch to using it as my main web
browser as well.
 
> > A third option is to just keep doing English-only maint-2.3 builds
> > back-to-back until tor-qa stops reporting crash bugs or strange issues.
> 
> I think there's a fourth option, which is urge people on the blog, via twitter,
> etc, to test the alpha/rc bundles, with me making a commitment to do frequent
> releases for any issues that pop up. 

Yes, this sounds great. I also commit to fixing reproducible crash bugs
immediately.

Roger also agrees that English-only builds are just fine for the
maint-2.3 bundles, at least until we get them to be more stable.

> So depending on the timeline people have in mind, my suggestion is to do a big
> push on the aforementioned social networks and shake out as many bugs in the
> next week as we can, then iterate. But my opinion depends a bit on how
> severe you think the Firefox 14 problem is.

I can fix reproducible crash bugs quickly, especially if a particular
website reliably (or even semi-reliably) triggers the crash.

If we have random instability that is hard to reproduce, that might be a
different story and may require dropping random suspicious patches.
I think we can just cross that bridge when it starts burning, though.

Therefore, as long as you're good building these English TBB alphas at a
pretty quick rate, I think we now have a plan.

I will commit my new FF14 patches, and let's start the builds!


-- 
Mike Perry
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