[tor-reports] Pearl Crescent Report - January 2016

[Mark Smith]

Tor-related work completed by the Pearl Crescent team in January 2016
(Kathy Brade and Mark Smith):

* Tor Browser Updater:

We fixed a few bugs related to the new "display changelog after update" 
feature that is part of Tor Browser 5.5:
   "Changelog after update is empty if JS is disabled" (unresolved)
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/17917

   "Changelog after update is empty on Windows"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18064

   "Update on non-en-US alpha bundles results in empty dialog"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18019

We also got involved in the discussion within this Firefox bug:
   "Firefox updates should use HTTP because HTTPS is unreliable"
   https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1239545
(it no longer looks like Mozilla will switch away from HTTPS without 
carefully considering the consequences).


* Tor Browser and Torbutton:

We helped with the 5.5 and 6.0a1 Tor Browser releases.

We investigated and developed a fix for a critical website compatibility 
regression that we introduced in Tor Browser 5.5:
   "Iframe based AJAX call blocked by popup-blocker or opening
    in new tab"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18168

We developed a patch for another regression that was introduced a while ago:
   "about:tor update arrow position is wrong (Retina and zoom)"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18144

We continued to work on changes to the on-disk layout of the Tor Browser 
app on Mac OS to meet Apple's code signing requirements (work in progress):
   "Tor Browser on OS X should not store data into the
    application bundle"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/13252

We triaged various tickets.

We reviewed many patches created by other developers, including for 
tickets #16322, 17931, 17965, 18017, and 18099.


* Tor Launcher:

We published and then revised our patches that make changes to the 
configuration wizard user experience. These changes are included in 
Browser 6.0a1.
   "setup wizard UI flow improvements"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/11773

We investigated a spurious error message that was introduced by the 
above changes and filed the following ticket:
   "attempt to open a socket after DisableNetwork=1 transition"
   https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/18154

We also reviewed a fix for #18113 and triaged various Tor Launcher bugs.


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


* Planned for February:
  - Revise the on-disk layout of the Tor Browser app on Mac OS
    to meet Apple's code signing requirements (see #13252).

  - Assist with Tor Browser 5.5.x maintenance.

* As Time Permits:
  - 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

  - 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

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

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