[ooni-dev] Fact-check my understanding of ooniprobe URL testing lists

[Arturo Filastò]

> On Jul 30, 2015, at 04:20, David Fifield <david at bamsoftware.com> wrote:
> 
> I'm working on a project where we're using OONI http_requests reports to
> find servers that block Tor users. I'd like you to check my
> understanding of where the URL lists for testing come from. I wrote:
> 	A single OONI report typically tests many URLs. For the most
> 	part, reports use the Citizen Lab URL testing lists
> 	(https://github.com/citizenlab/test-lists) which contain about
> 	1,200 "global" URLs, plus up to about about 900 additional
> 	country-specific URLs that are tested depending on the country
> 	in which ooniprobe is run. Users may run ooniprobe with their
> 	own custom URL lists; the results are uploaded to the global
> 	report pool. (There are several one-off reports in the data that
> 	test a single URL.)
> Is this true? Has it always been like this? How do ooniprobe users get
> updates when the list changes?


The above paragraph is correct.

Users will get updates to the URL list when they re-run the ooniresources —update-inputs commands or when they update their version of ooniprobe.

There are plans to have a more dynamic mechanism of provisioning probes with URLs and you can read more about that in this ticket:

https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/12551

Before v1.2.0 (Wed, 1 Oct 2014) we would have the default deck just run the alexa top 1k for every country.

This still does not preclude users from using their own custom URL lists or single URLs when testing.

Hope this helps,

~ Arturo