[tor-reports] Pearl Crescent Report - March 2016

[Mark Smith]

Work completed by the Pearl Crescent team during March 2016
(Kathy Brade and Mark Smith):

* Tor Browser and Torbutton:

We spent some time this month finishing up the patches needed for Mac OS 
code signing (coming soon to a Tor Browser alpha release):
   "Tor Browser on OS X should not store data into the
    application bundle"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/13252

We also started on some ESR45 tasks:
   "Rebase Tor Browser patches to ESR 45"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/15197

   "Place Canvas MediaStream behind site permission"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/15640

   "Make sure OffScreenCanvas API does not render moot our canvas
    fingerprinting protection"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18599

   "Make sure our SVG disabling patches work with SVG favicons"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18602

We did some testing of the Tor Browser stable and alpha releases that 
were made during March (5.5.3, 5.5.4, 6.0a3, 6.0a4).

We reviewed patches for tickets #16725, 18466, 18557, 18631, and 18632.


* Tor Browser Updater:

We rebased the updater patches for ESR45:
   "Rebase Tor Browser patches to ESR 45"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/15197#comment:11


* Tor Launcher:

Not much activity this month. We spent some time working on the 
following ticket but have not published a patch yet:
   "Tor Launcher only accepts HEXDIGIT passwords for controller"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18330

We also made a Tor Browser packaging change to ensure that the language 
prompt will not be shown in locale-specific packages:
   "modify Tor Browser packaging to avoid language prompt"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18455


* Miscellaneous Activities:
    We participated in the weekly Tor Browser meetings, UX meetings,
    and app team meetings on IRC, and in various design discussions
    on IRC as well as on the mailing lists.


* Planned for April:
  - Help with any followup work for Mac OS code signing (see #13252).

  - Assist with backporting of patches to the Firefox ESR 45 codebase
    and with the other work related to ESR 45. See: 
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/query?status!=closed&keywords=~ff45-esr&order=id

  - Assist with Tor Browser 5.5.x maintenance and 6.x alpha releases.


* As Time Permits:
  - Develop a fix for #18292 (staged updates fail on Windows).

  - Work with UX researchers to ensure that their Tor Launcher
    research is productive. See the discussions on the UX
    mailing list or visit:
    https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/TorLauncherUX2016

  - Work on other Tor Browser, Tor Launcher, and Torbutton usability
    issues.

-- 
Mark Smith
Pearl Crescent, LLC
http://pearlcrescent.com/