Bug #5466

Link to documentation in Tails Installer does not open the documentation because it points to an old URL which is not properly redirected in Tails

Added by Tails 2013-07-18 07:41:29 . Updated 2017-09-28 18:49:08 .

Status:
Resolved
Priority:
Normal
Assignee:
Category:
Installation
Target version:
Tails_3.2
Start date:
Due date:
% Done:

0%

Feature Branch:
bugfix/5466-fix-doc-link-from-splash-screen
Type of work:
Code
Blueprint:

Starter:
0
Affected tool:
Installer
Deliverable for:

Description

When running tails-installer in Tails, the link to the documentation is not open in a web browser when clicked, despite being correct (checked with right-click -> Copy link).

That’s still the case in Tails 3.0

Subtasks

Related issues

Related to Tails - Bug #8897: The link to persistence documentation in tails-persistence-setup doesn't trigger any user-visible action Resolved 2015-02-12
Related to Tails - Feature #8866: Rework the wording of Tails Installer Resolved 2015-02-04
Related to Tails - Bug #11576: Have a scenario of the assistant for Tails Installer Rejected 2016-07-17
Related to Tails - Bug #7904: Link to upgrade instructions in Tails Installer when a Tails USB stick is selected Resolved 2014-09-16
Blocks Tails - Feature #13424: Core work 2017Q3: User experience Resolved 2017-07-05

History

#1 Updated by intrigeri 2013-10-04 08:13:20

  • Category set to Installation
  • Starter set to No

#2 Updated by intrigeri 2014-06-04 16:38:32

  • Tracker changed from Feature to Bug
  • Subject changed from fix opening of documentation from USB installer to Link to documentation in Tails Installer does not open the documentation

#3 Updated by kytv 2015-01-03 01:21:30

This is still the case in Tails 1.2.2.

#4 Updated by BitingBird 2015-01-04 19:06:46

  • Affected tool set to Installer

#5 Updated by intrigeri 2015-02-12 21:06:07

  • related to Bug #8897: The link to persistence documentation in tails-persistence-setup doesn't trigger any user-visible action added

#6 Updated by sajolida 2015-04-26 08:33:19

I’m not sure how important this link is and I suggest we remove it.

If I understand correctly, it’s broken from the same reason that we cannot put working links in the message from Tails Upgrader and other applications that run with a different UID. I would be very happy to have a general fix for this, but until then I think that this link it not so important and that we rather work on getting rid of that sceen (Feature #8859).

#7 Updated by sajolida 2015-04-26 08:48:15

  • related to Feature #8866: Rework the wording of Tails Installer added

#8 Updated by intrigeri 2015-04-26 09:38:15

> I’m not sure how important this link is and I suggest we remove it.

Works for me.

> If I understand correctly, it’s broken from the same reason that we cannot put working links in the message from Tails Upgrader and other applications that run with a different UID.

Just for the sake of providing some background: I don’t think that’s the case. To the best of my knowledge, there’s no security-driven limitation that could be causing this bug (contrary to the Upgrader’s case). If I had to guess, I would look into the way Qt4 applications are supposed to handle URLs — I suspect we’re simply lacking some trivial configuration, somewhere.

Besides, we’ll have to port Tails Installer to Qt5 or GTK3 (Feature #8980), which is yet another reason not to waste time on this bug right now.

#9 Updated by Anonymous 2015-10-02 17:08:52

This has been fixed in the new upstream version of Tails Installer, based on the feature/jessie branch. Right clicking or clicking has the expected outcome.

#10 Updated by Anonymous 2015-10-02 17:09:51

This also works in the latest version of Tails Installer based on master / tails/wheezy.
Actually, no it does not work by clicking. Only when copying the link in the version based on Qt.

#11 Updated by Anonymous 2015-10-02 17:13:39

  • Status changed from Confirmed to Resolved
  • Target version set to Tails_2.0

#12 Updated by elouann 2016-11-21 16:13:55

  • Status changed from Resolved to Confirmed
  • Target version deleted (Tails_2.0)
  • Type of work changed from Code to Discuss

Reopening, as it’s not fixed.
We should discuss if we want to fix it or remove the link

#13 Updated by intrigeri 2016-11-26 13:29:29

  • Assignee set to sajolida
  • QA Check set to Info Needed

How does this relate to Feature #9006 and friends? IOW, will this be a non-issue once we have Feature #9006 done?

#14 Updated by sajolida 2016-12-28 21:26:41

  • related to Bug #11576: Have a scenario of the assistant for Tails Installer added

#15 Updated by sajolida 2016-12-28 21:29:45

  • Assignee deleted (sajolida)
  • QA Check deleted (Info Needed)

I don’t know what “IOW” means but the future screen will also have a link to the documentation. See https://mailman.boum.org/pipermail/tails-ux/attachments/20160629/62e60034/attachment-0003.png.

If that’s complicated, we could consider removing this link. For example, until we have Bug #11576 it might point only to https://tails.boum.org/install/ which is useful but not as good as it could be. If we decide to remove this link (maybe temporarily) then we could skip Bug #11576 as well.

#16 Updated by intrigeri 2016-12-29 11:32:20

  • Assignee set to sajolida
  • QA Check set to Info Needed

> […] the future screen will also have a link to the documentation.
> See https://mailman.boum.org/pipermail/tails-ux/attachments/20160629/62e60034/attachment-0003.png.

OK, thanks for clarifying!

I’ve had a quick look and here’s the error:

tails-installer-launcher.desktop[4322]: (tails-installer-launcher:4322): Gtk-WARNING **: Unable to show 'file:///usr/share/doc/tails/website/doc/first_steps/installation.en.html': Error when getting information for file '/usr/share/doc/tails/website/doc/first_steps/installation.en.html': No such file or directory

… so if I get it right, that’s been broken when we dropped the old installation doc (commit:8564156509aa87f7aa15b078aadada131987095d). Take-home lesson: when renaming or deleting pages from our website, also look for references to these pages in the source code of our custom packages :)

Anyway, it seems trivial to fix. Where should the link that’s in the current splash screen of Tails Installer point to?

#17 Updated by sajolida 2017-04-07 15:21:45

#18 Updated by xin 2017-06-27 00:21:06

  • related to Bug #7904: Link to upgrade instructions in Tails Installer when a Tails USB stick is selected added

#19 Updated by Anonymous 2017-06-27 09:19:28

tails-installer 4.4.14+dfsg-1 in Debian does correctly open the documentation link using the default browser configured in GNOME. It is currently pointing to https://tails.boum.org/install/

However, in Tails 3.0, clicking on the documentation does not open the browser/documentation. Furthermore, the link points to file://usr/share/doc/tails/website/doc/first_steps/installation.en.html which redirects to the installation assistant when opened as https://tails.boum.org/doc/first_steps/installation.en.html but fails to redirect within Tails. So I believe that the problem here is not only about the link itself pointing to a wrong URL, but mainly about the click action being inactive.

#20 Updated by Anonymous 2017-06-27 10:34:25

  • Description updated

#21 Updated by Anonymous 2017-06-27 10:37:18

  • Assignee changed from sajolida to intrigeri
  • QA Check deleted (Info Needed)
  • Type of work changed from Discuss to Code

All in all, I believe this is a bug in Tails, and not a UX issue.
The link should for the moment point to the installation assistant main page. Bug #11576 will take it from there.

The fact that the link is not opened might be due to some TorBrowser problem not opening URLs, or some AppArmor issue not permitting such clicks (I did not test that hypothesis). Also see Bug #8897 which might be due to the same problem (running as a different user). So reassigning to the foundations team, please check who should investigate this issue and reassign accordingly. Thanks!

#22 Updated by Anonymous 2017-06-27 10:45:17

  • Subject changed from Link to documentation in Tails Installer does not open the documentation to Link to documentation in Tails Installer does not open the documentation and points to an old URL which is not properly redirected in Tails

#23 Updated by intrigeri 2017-06-27 12:39:43

  • Assignee changed from intrigeri to sajolida
  • QA Check set to Info Needed

u wrote:
> The fact that the link is not opened might be due to […]

As debugged 6 months ago already, the link works just fine when it points to an existing file, so we’re back to the question I asked earlier (Bug #5466#note-16): where should this link point to? So putting back onto sajolida’s plate. Then I’ll be happy to implement the fix.

> Also see Bug #8897 which might be due to the same problem (running as a different user).

FYI Tails Installer is not run as a different user.

#24 Updated by Anonymous 2017-06-27 14:20:13

intrigeri wrote:
> u wrote:
> > The fact that the link is not opened might be due to […]
>
> As debugged 6 months ago already, the link works just fine when it points to an existing file, so we’re back to the question I asked earlier (Bug #5466#note-16): where should this link point to? So putting back onto sajolida’s plate. Then I’ll be happy to implement the fix.

I think that for now it should just point to the installation assistant’s main page. In Debian, this works correctly. And if we want to modify the link later, we will do that later (Bug #11576).
However, I believe, that Bug #11576 will take some more time because the proposed link will still need to be written.

> > Also see Bug #8897 which might be due to the same problem (running as a different user).
>
> FYI Tails Installer is not run as a different user.

No, but the browser.

#25 Updated by Anonymous 2017-06-27 14:21:51

  • Subject changed from Link to documentation in Tails Installer does not open the documentation and points to an old URL which is not properly redirected in Tails to Link to documentation in Tails Installer does not open the documentation because it points to an old URL which is not properly redirected in Tails

So: @sajolida should apparently decide where we should point this link to so that we don’t have to review that twice.

#26 Updated by sajolida 2017-07-05 19:05:54

#27 Updated by sajolida 2017-07-05 19:06:06

#28 Updated by sajolida 2017-08-15 15:36:11

  • Assignee changed from sajolida to anonym
  • Target version set to Tails_3.2
  • QA Check changed from Info Needed to Ready for QA
  • Feature Branch set to bugfix/5466-fix-doc-link-from-splash-screen

Here is a branch at last!

Note that if Feature #9005 is merged in time for 3.2, then this branch is useless.

#29 Updated by anonym 2017-09-15 17:50:27

  • Status changed from Confirmed to Rejected
  • Assignee deleted (anonym)
  • QA Check deleted (Ready for QA)

sajolida wrote:
> Note that if Feature #9005 is merged in time for 3.2, then this branch is useless.

It was (well,the Feature #8859 part was) so I reject this ticket.

#30 Updated by intrigeri 2017-09-15 19:02:55

  • Status changed from Rejected to Fix committed

So that’s one more bug fixed (incidentally) in 3.2 :)

#31 Updated by anonym 2017-09-28 18:49:08

  • Status changed from Fix committed to Resolved