Review error prompt shown when Tor exits

marked this issue as related to #43185

assigned to @henry

marked this issue as related to #42213

changed the description

mentioned in issue #42213

I would suggest that instead of showing a prompt, we open "about:torconnect" instead to show the error. Might be good to consider as part of the "about:torconnect" redesign.

Yes, I agree.

I think we have several issue about this and similar pain point.

The first kind of error could be handled with an unrecoverable error in the TorConnect state machine (we shouldn't switch to Configuring if this error ever appears).

I don't have any suggestions for the case in which Tor crashes during the usage. It happened to me very rarely in real usage.

@pierov do you know whether this would have much effect on other distributions of the browser where tor is managed externally, like Tails?

They might have some error when we cannot to the control port, but I don't know what happens in that case. Probably the same prompt, even though restart will trigger a re-connection to the control port, rather than an actual restart.

(IIRC, Tails still uses the control port for the circuit display).

Related issues: #21053 (closed), #41921 (closed), possibly more (this is a pain point also on Android).

(this is a pain point also on Android)

Are we lacking an equivalent to the "Tor unexpectedly exited" dialog on Android, which would explain why we're seeing reports of users receiving "proxy refused" errors after visiting websites instead?

For example:

Are we lacking an equivalent to the "Tor unexpectedly exited" dialog on Android, which would explain why we're seeing reports of users receiving "proxy refused" errors after visiting websites instead?

We have the same dialog, but it needs a tab to be open to see it.

I.e., when you're in settings or in the "home" you won't see it.

The proxy refused isn't necessarily due to the process exiting, but it's a possible cause.

The problem with #42714 might be that some devices to funny things with Unix sockets... 14.5a1 will have a pref to disable Unix sockets for SOCKS and use TCP, so hopefully we'll receive some feedback on whether this solves the problem or it's something else.

marked this issue as related to #21053 (closed)

marked this issue as related to #41921 (closed)

marked #21053 (closed) as a duplicate of this issue

mentioned in issue #21053 (closed)

added Roadmap::Future label

added Task label

mentioned in issue #43273 (moved)

assigned to @felicia and unassigned @henry

removed Desktop label

added All Platforms label

mentioned in issue tpo/ux/research#149

changed milestone to %Tor Browser 14.5

mentioned in issue #41921 (closed)

added Backlog label and removed Roadmap::Future label

added Doing label and removed Backlog label

@donuts I made the changes we discussed, aligning the error screens when Tor exits with other existing error screens (check prototype here)

I'll hand this issue over to you and move it to review. Not sure if that's the correct protocol though, so pls lmk if I should keep myself as Assignee.

assigned to @donuts and unassigned @felicia

added Needs Review label and removed Doing label

mentioned in issue #43406 (closed)

@felicia brought up an interesting point in #43406 (comment 3155811). What should the current "Connect" button do whilst the tor process is dead.

At the moment this button will:

Open about:torconnect, or switch to the tab.
Starts a normal bootstrap if we have not yet encountered a bootstrap error. In this case, the button is purple. Otherwise the button is grey and does nothing else.

If we do incorporate the error into about:torconnect then whilst the tor process is dead we could have this button remain grey but visible and similarly allow users to open about:torconnect.

In principle, we could make this also trigger a further action of restarting the tor process. But I personally think it would be sufficient to just load about:torconnect where that action will be shown in the page.

Considering the mockups we're working on, there isn't Connect button in the address bar when Tor exits anymore (desktop screens below).

daemon failed before initialization:

daemon failed after initialization:

So clicking on "Restart Tor" would basically restart the process (is this the same as restarting tor daemon?), taking the user back to the first step as if they had just opened the browser (but keeping their tabs). Does this behavior makes sense to you?

Just a reminder: these mockups are still on review, so we might still make improvements on them.

So clicking on "Restart Tor" would basically restart the process (is this the same as restarting tor daemon?), taking the user back to the first step as if they had just opened the browser (but keeping their tabs). Does this behavior makes sense to you?

Yes, that makes sense to me.

Considering the mockups we're working on, there isn't Connect button in the address bar when Tor exits anymore (desktop screens below).

This makes sense since we already hide the "Connect" button when the about:torconnect tab is selected. I think it would make sense to show this in other tabs as a means of returning to the about:torconnect page, or re-opening it.

We can test this out when it comes to implementation, rather than figuring it out beforehand.

Sounds good.

I think it would make sense to show this in other tabs as a means of returning to the about:torconnect page, or re-opening it.

We can continue this specific topic at #43465 (closed) :)

added 13m of time spent

These errors seem to be identical except for the headings:

"Tor Browser couldn't initialize"
"Tor Browser stopped working"

I wonder if there's an opportunity to choose a heading that works in both contexts instead? Ultimately the causes, recommendations and course of action are the same anyway.

I agree about the headings, but it seems (according to previous comments) that causes, recommendations and course of action are not always the same.

Got it, thank you. Please ignore this suggestion then.

Not at all, it's a good suggestion hahah maybe I can unite some parts of the UI.

Other small nitpicks:

"A potential bug" sounds a bit vague/casual to me, but I may be overthinking things here.
Conversely "How might you fix this?" is a bit formal. Could you swap it with "How can you fix this?" instead please @felicia?

And a couple of questions:

Is it more accurate to say "Tor couldn't initialize" and "Tor stopped working", instead of "Tor Browser..."?
Is there a reason the copy is different on Android for the first error (Tor Browser couldn't initialize), but not the second (Tor Browser stopped working)?

Is it more accurate to say "Tor couldn't initialize" and "Tor stopped working", instead of "Tor Browser..."?

Yes, it is more accurate in terms of what is actually happening. The browser process is fine, but the tor networking process is dead.

Some other things to add:

Should we add a brief explanation for what the daemon is? E.g. "The Tor Browser daemon that controls your connection to the Tor network isn't working properly".
In the case where you need to exit another tor application, the user in Tor Browser would still need to press the "Restart Tor" button. The current wording implies you wouldn't need to because "Restart Tor" is shown as a separate option, rather than the required step.
@pierov can you check over the figma design to see if there is another common cause we can add to "What could be causing this?", and another common resolution to add to "How might you fix this?".
How should we communicate to the user a successful or failed attempt to restart the Tor process? There is a small amount of time between us restarting the tor process and knowing that it works. In principle, we could show the next stage "Connect to Tor" and then switch back to the "broken" page if it fails, but the user might mistake this for "it worked for a bit, but then broke again" and it could be jarring. Or we could have a separate loading "Restarting Tor..." page, which likely wouldn't appear for long. Or a loading indicator within the current "broken" page and a message when it fails.

For desktop a user might have messed up with browser files (e.g., the torrc-defaults). It's harder on Android.

As for the restart, what if we showed a spinning circle on the restart button, or something similar to show we're doing something?

The initialization is an exposed async function IIRC, so we should be able to be notified of when it finishes (either successfully or failing).

These are all great suggestions, thank you – I think this one is particularly important:

Should we add a brief explanation for what the daemon is? E.g. "The Tor Browser daemon that controls your connection to the Tor network isn't working properly".

@felicia Could you work a short one-sentence explanation into the error, please?

@donuts sure! I'll try to improve copy using these suggestions.

Is there a reason the copy is different on Android for the first error (Tor Browser couldn't initialize), but not the second (Tor Browser stopped working)?

This one is different because there's only one thing causing the problem (a potential bug) and a single solution (restarting Tor). I'll made a version similar to the other ones, though... then I'll think about ways to improve copy.

Regarding the "potential bug"... the cause itself sound too vague to me as well. @pierov would it be possible for us to determine what kind of bug that made Tor exits?

For desktop a user might have messed up with browser files (e.g., the torrc-defaults). It's harder on Android.

@pierov in this case, I assume it would be too difficult for us to suggest a way out, wouldn't it?

I was thinking moreso along the lines of:

The Tor daemon has stopped working due to a different technical issue.

So not offering more information per se, but just developing the copy a little more.

@donuts sounds good.

@henry if the Tor daemon exits, is it safe to say that "Tor Browser couldn't connect to the Tor network"? I was thinking about that since you said:

"The Tor Browser daemon that controls your connection to the Tor network isn't working properly"

@pierov would it be possible for us to determine what kind of bug that made Tor exits?

Nope. One can only look at logs, which are half broken in that state (because of #42300 (closed)).

For desktop a user might have messed up with browser files (e.g., the torrc-defaults). It's harder on Android.

@pierov in this case, I assume it would be too difficult for us to suggest a way out, wouldn't it?

We could suggest the user to undo any (manual) change they might have made to Tor Browser's program files, or something like this

@henry if the Tor daemon exits, is it safe to say that "Tor Browser couldn't connect to the Tor network"? I was thinking about that since you said:

Not really. Whilst the Tor daemon is running it is not necessarily connected to the Tor network, which requires it to bootstrap first.

In particular, the problem with saying "Tor Browser couldn't connect to the Tor network" is that it would misleadingly imply that we tried to connect to the Tor network before the user has bootstrapped.

removed Needs Review label

added Doing label

assigned to @felicia and unassigned @donuts

removed Task label

added Feature label

added UX Team label

added Project 163 label

I've tentatively tagged this as Project 163 because there's an Android component to this issue, and the proposed improvement (a more helpful error message) would benefit mobile users in the Global South.

added Needs Review label and removed Doing label

assigned to @donuts and unassigned @felicia

Handing this issue back over to @felicia, as I think it's looking great. The only remaining comment preventing dev hand-off is agreeing on the working state for the "Restart Tor" button.

assigned to @felicia and unassigned @donuts

removed Needs Review label

added Doing label

changed the description

added 2 designs

changed milestone to %Tor Browser 15.0

Review error prompt shown when Tor exits

Context

Opportunity statement

Scope

Out of scope

Mockups

Acceptance criteria

Scenario 1 - Restarting Tor

Scenario 2 - Restarting Tor succeeds

Scenario 3 - Restarting Tor fails

Scenario 4 - Turning off battery saver on Android

Designs

Child items ...

Activity