Build date frozen in UA string for SM 2.14.1 and later

[James]

Honestly, why not just go back to the way it worked fine before and only try this again when things are more organized.

bug 728610 shows they jumped into it without noticing this obvious issue until after as a example.

[rsx11m]

Here we go - Kairo filed bug 728952 to also remove the "dot"-level version number from SeaMonkey, thus we'd be stuck with "Gecko/13.0 Firefox/13.0 SeaMonkey/2.10" for everything on a rapid-release cycle (including aurora, beta, release, and oilspill follow-up releases). I don't buy the argumentation that this is a good idea and contributes to the user's privacy; if the Zimbra issue hadn't come up nobody would have touched that (at least not now...).

[James]

You should see what some of the Firefox nightly testers are starting to do with their UA with general.useragent.override preference now that Mozilla apparently thinks the UA is not so important anymore. They are putting in 20120101 (used by release builds) and changing their Firefox version to some random. viewtopic.php?f=23&t=2431421&start=30

[rsx11m]

Well, so now they've backed out both the Gecko/date and the patch-level bugs from mozilla-central, thus it may change back to "normal" by tomorrow, unless they back out the backout again and then it's backed in (this is getting crazy).

[rsx11m]

... and now the patch-level patch is back in, but not the Gecko/date patch, so this will be an interesting mix for tomorrow's nightly builds.

[Philip Chee]

... and now the patch-level patch is back in, but not the Gecko/date patch, so this will be an interesting mix for tomorrow's nightly builds.

My head hurts.

But as Asa sez:

These actions are user-hostile and I cannot believe we're continuing to shoot ourselves in the foot like this.

Phil

[rsx11m]

One of the few reasonable statements in that bug report:

TBH, I'm increasingly thinking mucking about with the UA is simply the wrong battle to be fighting at this time. It's an enormous time sink, attracts vast amounts of flames, and there are so much more important things to be fixing and investing time in.

Couldn't agree more...

[rsx11m]

And yet another bug with a patch, this time for Fennec to back out the Gecko/date-vs.-version patch on their end (bug 729348), in order to "match other platforms" (I'm still wondering why they started with that unilaterally in the first place, but that story should be in bug 671634).

[ElTxolo]

One of the few reasonable statements in that bug report:

TBH, I'm increasingly thinking mucking about with the UA is simply the wrong battle to be fighting at this time. It's an enormous time sink, attracts vast amounts of flames, and there are so much more important things to be fixing and investing time in.

Couldn't agree more...

It seems at least, that somebody (> Justin Dolske) in MoFo/MoCo still uses the common sense.

[rsx11m]

And Dão even objects against adding the Build ID into about:support (which is now bug 589444 as it was filed before), it's amazing...

[Philip Chee]

And Dão even objects against adding the Build ID into about:support (which is now bug 589444 as it was filed before), it's amazing...

Let me guess. He's never spent a day doing user support on SUMO?

Phil

[James]

Especially in Firefox, SeaMonkey and Thunderbird builds section here since this whole build ID date thing affect the Nightly and Aurora channels.

He has no account here with that email address.

[LoudNoise]

But as Asa sez:

These actions are user-hostile and I cannot believe we're continuing to shoot ourselves in the foot like this.

Phil

He didn't come up with the idea.

[rsx11m]

Note that the Gecko/<date> to Gecko/<version> patch has relanded on trunk "for testing" without being clear if it will be allowed to propagate to the aurora and beta channels (thus, it likely will unless "major" issues are found, wherever that threshold will be set). Thus, it should become visible again with tomorrow's SM 2.12a1 nightly builds.

[ElTxolo]

Note that the Gecko/<date> to Gecko/<version> patch has relanded on trunk "for testing" without being clear if it will be allowed to propagate to the aurora and beta channels (thus, it likely will unless "major" issues are found, wherever that threshold will be set). Thus, it should become visible again with tomorrow's SM 2.12a1 nightly builds.

Bug #588909 - [RESOLVED FIXED] Replace Gecko/<date> with Gecko/<version> in UA string
Such a shame!

BTW totally agree with this comment (... Hm, strange, 15 is mentioned only three times, that's may be not enough!)