[tor-bugs] #20174 [Core Tor/Tor]: Automate checking existing fallbacks

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#20174: Automate checking existing fallbacks
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 Reporter:  teor                                 |          Owner:  haxxpop
     Type:  enhancement                          |         Status:
                                                 |  needs_revision
 Priority:  Medium                               |      Milestone:  Tor:
                                                 |  unspecified
Component:  Core Tor/Tor                         |        Version:  Tor:
                                                 |  0.2.8.1-alpha
 Severity:  Normal                               |     Resolution:
 Keywords:  fallback, tor-03-unspecified-201612  |  Actual Points:
Parent ID:                                       |         Points:  1
 Reviewer:                                       |        Sponsor:
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Changes (by teor):

 * status:  needs_review => needs_revision


Comment:

 Thanks for this patch!
 It implements the existing fallback check from
 https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/wiki/doc/UpdatingFallbackDirectoryMirrors

 But I think we can do it better:
 * using os.system() is error-prone, because it calls out to a shell. It
 also raises security concerns. Can you re-write the loading and parsing
 steps in Python?
 * modifying the existing files isn't necessary - instead, create a
 temporary file, and change WHITELIST_FILE_NAME to point to it - or, even
 better, parse the existing file straight into the whitelist data structure
 * now that the script takes arguments, please modify the script's usage
 comment (line 3), or, even better, provide a "help" command that outputs
 the usage string on any unrecognised command-line argument

 (I'll review the #20178 part after these changes.)

--
Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/20174#comment:6>
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