[tor-bugs] #32683 [Metrics/Relay Search]: Relay Search should be able to handle non-numbers in "as:" parameter

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#32683: Relay Search should be able to handle non-numbers in "as:" parameter
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 Reporter:  karsten               |          Owner:  metrics-team
     Type:  defect                |         Status:  needs_review
 Priority:  Medium                |      Milestone:
Component:  Metrics/Relay Search  |        Version:
 Severity:  Normal                |     Resolution:
 Keywords:                        |  Actual Points:
Parent ID:                        |         Points:
 Reviewer:                        |        Sponsor:
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Changes (by karsten):

 * status:  new => needs_review


Comment:

 I took a quick look at the code, and it seems it's mainly a problem of
 printing out a better error message. In this case Relay Search sends the
 query to Onionoo which returns a 400. But Relay Search doesn't properly
 identify the error message as client-side/query problem and prints out the
 wrong message.

 Please review [https://gitweb.torproject.org/user/karsten/metrics-
 web.git/commit/?h=task-32683&id=461355484a3f83a10bd68c88fb3098cf427f6b30
 commit 4613554 in my task-32683 branch] that contains a possible fix that
 prints out a new "Query error!" message for all 4xx responses. That's at
 least more accurate than saying it's a JavaScript error, even though it
 doesn't go into the details of saying which query parameter part is wrong.

 Regarding the suggestion to figure out whether the user put in a name or a
 number in a field, I believe that Relay Search isn't doing much parameter
 checking before sending requests to Onionoo. Of course it would be
 possible to do the same checks that Onionoo does in the browser. But
 that's not a trivial amount of work to do once and to keep in sync. In any
 case that would be an enhancement, not a defect, and if we really care, we
 should open a new (enhancement) ticket for that.

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Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/32683#comment:2>
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