[tor-bugs] #10864 [TorBrowserButton]: Please create a specific “Unable to connect” page

[Tor Bug Tracker & Wiki]

#10864: Please create a specific “Unable to connect” page
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 Reporter:  lunar             |          Owner:  mikeperry
     Type:  enhancement       |         Status:  new
 Priority:  normal            |      Milestone:
Component:  TorBrowserButton  |        Version:
 Keywords:                    |  Actual Points:
Parent ID:                    |         Points:
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 The support help desk is kept busy with messages like “I can't connect to
 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.onion” when the problem is that the hidden service is
 simply down.
 Our default answer is currently in the like of “Can you connect to the Tor
 Project's website through http://idnxcnkne4qt76tg.onion/ ? Then Tor is
 working and that hidden service is simply down. We have no control over it
 anyway.”

 It would probably be good to try to improve the “Unable to connect” page
 to help
 users understand what's happening when they can't reach a hidden service.

 The current “Unable to connect” page says:

 > Unable to connect
 >
 > Firefox can't establish a connection to the server at
 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.onion.
 >
 >  * The site could be temporarily unavailable or busy. Try again in a few
 moments.
 >  * If you are unable to load any pages, check your computer's network
 connection.
 >  * If your computer or network is protected by a firewall or proxy, make
 sure that TorBrowser is permitted to access the Web.

 The first statement is misleading for hidden services. This is likely due
 to the different behaviour of hidden services: without Tor, Firefox issues
 DNS lookups first and by default will not display this page when a domain
 is unresolvable. It will only display it after the resolution, when trying
 to connect to the IP address. For hidden services, we can't make the
 difference, and we might want to make that clearer.

 The last statement is confusing no matter what. At this stage, we know if
 the Tor Browser is able to reach the Tor network or not, so it might make
 sense to simply remove it.

 This ticket is also related to #8000.

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Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/10864>
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