[tor-project] Tor Browser team meeting notes, 16 September 2019

Matthew Finkel sysrqb at torproject.org
Thu Sep 19 15:18:46 UTC 2019


Hello!

We held our weekly Tor Browser meeting on Monday in #tor-meeting2. Here
is the IRC log:
http://meetbot.debian.net/tor-meeting2/2019/tor-meeting2.2019-09-16-17.30.log.txt


>From the weekly updates, we discussed and planned a Tor Browser Alpha
release for
Mac OS X due to the new notarization requirement. This will allow for
additional
testing before Tor Browser 9.0 becomes the stable version. We also
discussed
backporting a patch onto Tor Browser 8.5 for this and including it in
the next
stable release.

>From the discussions, we decided on making about:blank the default New
Tab page
(instead of Firefox's new about:home page), and about:tor will be an
alternative
option.

We are also beginning the triage of Tor Browser tickets for Bug Smashing
and we
are adding the keyword "BugSmashFund" on the applicable tickets.

Finally, we are aiming at releasing the new Tor Network Settings UI in
an upcoming
alpha release. This moves the configuration settings menu from Tor
Launcher into
the browser's preferences screen (about:preferences#tor).


Below are the notes from our meeting pad:

Discussion:
    (acat) Should we allow users to change New Tab page to "Firefox
Home" (Firefox default new tab page)? see
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/31575
    (pili) BugSmashFund: if you see any bugs that are outside sponsor
work and would be good to fix after ESR68 work is over please tag on
trac with "BugSmashFund" keyword
    (pili) Gentle reminder to update tickets for September with points
estimate and actual points once closed.
    (anto) could we have #31286 (Tor Network Settings on
about:preferences#tor) on alpha channel?

GeKo:
    Last week:
         - Bug 30126: Apple notarization
         - Bug 31538: Windows reproducibility
         - Bug 31584: Clean-up mingw-w64 project (currently testing a
final patch)
         - fixed Windows nightly build failure (#31732)
         - wrote a patch for #31725 (mk localization did not work
properly)
         - worked on missing pieces for #30429
           - acat/sysrqb where are we with the reviews/fixups for
#31010? Is there anything left from your side?
         - reviews (#24653, #26345, #30304, #31575)
         - double-checked our hardening flag situation for Windows and
Linux bundles after toolchain updates; I think there a no surprises and
unknown issues that popped up
         - caught up with blog comments (having 4 active blog posts to
take care of in parallel is harder than thought :) )
     This week:
         - stack smashing protection for Windows binaries (#29013)
         - #31597 (Mozilla bug review for bugs squashed between Firefox
61-68)
         - finish missing pieces for #30429
         - maybe release for testing #30126 on alpha channel? we'd need
#31702 for that which is supposed to apply cleanly for esr68 at least;
apple is saying Catalina gets out in October so, we might have a bit
more time here?
         - reviews

mcs and brade:
    Last week:
        - Testing and research for #30126 (Make Tor Browser on macOS
compatible with Apple's notarization).
        - Verified that #31464 is no longer an issue (meek and moat are
broken on macOS 10.9).
        - Debugged #31607 (App menu items stop working).
            - On macOS, menu-related objects are being freed too soon or
at the wrong time.
            - This is a strange issue that is proving to be difficult to
debug. (GeKo: Do we know which patch is causing that? If not, could we
track down this bug easier that way? mcs: We think it is not caused by a
patch but by Tor Launcher opening a modal window during startup but we
will confirm)
     This week/upcoming:
        - Continue work on #31607 (App menu items stop working).
        - #31491 (clean up the old meek http helper browser profiles).
        - Work on other tbb-9.0-must-alpha tickets if time permits.
        - Reminder: we will be on vacation next week.

sysrqb:
    Last week:
        Mostly afk.
        Releases
        Began dog-fooding 9.0a6
    This week:
        - Pick up #30943 again (only private tabs as the default)
        - Investigate auto-complete not working on 9.0a6 Android
(#31720)
        - Maybe look at showing Tor Browser version number on Android
(#30943)
        - Maybe help with getting x86_64 Android builds (#31192)

_hc/eighthave:
    Last week:
        tor-android clean-up work, 64-bit builds and configure.ac
--enable-android path
        tor-android reproducible build (given the same docker container)
    This week:
        Android-native TorService

tjr:
 - Worked on the WASM patch but waiting on help:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1576254
- Landed the alloc/dealloc patch in 68:
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1547519#c32
   - There are a couple of concerning test failures for the MinGW build
in the esr68 branch that might/are probably related to this.
   - I need to fix my IDA installation to be able to dig into these
though...


boklm:
    Last week:
        - Did some reviews:
            - #31450 (Still use GCC for 64bit Linux debug builds after
switch to 68 ESR)
            - #31264 (tar.gz output files contain non-reproducible
timestamps)
            - #31621 (Fix node bug that makes large writes to stdout
fail)
            - #31641 (Provide link to Tor Browser for Android alpha on
our alpha download page)
            - #31596 (Bump mingw-w64 version to pick up fix for #31567)
            - #31732 (Windows nightly build failure)
        - Made a patch for #31448 (gold and lld break linking 32bit
Linux bundles we need to resort to bfd)
        - Opened #31755 (Separate update pings and update requests
graphs for Tor Browser alpha and release users)
        - Looked at #31646 (Update abicheck to require newer
libstdc++.so.6)
    This week:
        - Test patch for #31538 (Windows bundles based on ESR 68 are not
built reproducibly)
        - Review #27493 ('mk_add_options' or 'export' MOZILLA_OFFICIAL)
        - Make patch for #31646 (Update abicheck to require newer
libstdc++.so.6)
        - will be afk on Tuesday (tomorrow)

acat:
     Last week:
        - #26345 - Finish Disable tracking protection UI in FF67-esr (in
review)
         - Investigated if serviceworkers can still see localized msgs
in #30683.
        - Investigated a bit RemoteSettings background requests: #31740
        - Created Bugzilla ticket for #30683
(https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1581537)
    This week:
        - 31303: Browser Toolbox fails to open when tor-launcher is
present V(is it fine if I take this one pospeselr?)
        - tbb-9.0-must-alpha tickets

sisbell:
    Last Week:
  - #31564: Android bundles not reproducible - implemented solution
using apktool. Need verification if it works across build machines with
different OS. (GeKo: I'll do that while reviewing)
  - #31568: Gradle how-to.  Found solution to remove missing resources
that was causing double artifact entries. Documented this.
   This week:
  - open tickets for tor-android-service patches
  - 31564 (if additional changes needed)
  - 31192 -  x86_64 support

Pili:
      Last week:
          - mostly afk
          - Gave a talk on using onion services for APIs at API Days
Barcelona
    This week:
        - Looking at our roadmap and capacity
        - Moving forward with team lead transition tasks

Antonela:
    - #31660 - Investigating about ESR68 Onboarding >
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/31660
    - #31286 - TB9 Network Settings is almost done. Shared with phw and
the anti-censorship team to have them in the same page. >
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/31286
    - #27511 - Working with TB New Identity >
https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/27511
    - Back to S27 Onion Services

pospeselr:

    Last Week:

          got moat bridgedb requests mostly working with new
about:preferences#tor page (#31286)

    CAPTCHA displayed, guesses can be made and submitted, bridge strings
returned back but aren't displayed or saved anywhere

    This  Week:

    rebase current patches to latest esr68 branch >:[

    port over the read/write logic for the tor proxy settings, and
integrate that into the bridgedb request logic



Have a good week!
Matt


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