1499743 - Remove the typed restriction character, change the url and search ones

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(Firefox :: Address Bar, enhancement, P1)

Description

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

This may need a relnote.

The typed restriction char (~) is not particularly useful due to our bogus typed definition, and we'd like to simplify restriction chars as far as possible.

The url restriction char is now conflicting with the search alias feature, and as such it would be better to change it. We may reuse the ~, or another possibility could be to change it to "|" that is more widely available across layouts, and wouldn't confuse users of ~.

Comment 1

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

Maybe, considered from a while we'd like to change the search restriction char from $ to ? (for things like bug 1315509 and bug 1334019), we could use $ for url restriction. The reason I'd like to avoid ~ and | is because those are more commonly used in command lines and I'd not want to prevent searching those.

There's also an advantage into doing both changes at the same time, where we can just relnote it once, and break habits in a single version, rather than doing muscle memory damage twice (once to change the url restriction and twice to change the search restriction).

Comment 2

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

Attachment: Bug 1499743 - Address Bar restriction characters: remove typed, change url and search

Remove the "~" typed restriction character.
Change the url restriction character to "$" and the search one to "?".

Comment 3

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

For the relnote:

Address Bar restriction characters changed: it is no more possible to restrict results to typed urls ("~"). Matching only on url now uses the "$" character, instead of "@". Restricting results to search suggestions uses the "?" character, instead of "$".

Comment 4

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/4ff8166e2669
Address Bar restriction characters: remove typed, change url and search r=adw

Comment 5

[Stefan Hindli [:stefan_hindli]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/4ff8166e2669

Comment 6

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

Attachment: 1499743.diff

[Beta/Release Uplift Approval Request]

Feature/Bug causing the regression: None

User impact if declined: We would like to release a blog post regarding the new Search Shortcuts feature in Firefox 64, and it would also point out these additional restriction chars. Changing the chars in 65 would practically made that impossible, so we'd like to change them in 64.

Is this code covered by automated tests?: Yes

Has the fix been verified in Nightly?: Yes

Needs manual test from QE?: Yes

If yes, steps to reproduce: Use restriction characters in the Address Bar

List of other uplifts needed: None

Risk to taking this patch: Low

Why is the change risky/not risky? (and alternatives if risky): It's just changing the chars, it may break muscle memory but it would happen regardless at 65. Needs a rel-note

String changes made/needed:

Comment 7

[Julien Cristau [:jcristau]]

Comment on attachment 9023777 [details] [diff] [review]
1499743.diff

urlbar shortcuts change to coincide with search shortcuts in 64, approved for 64.0b9

Comment 8

[Natalia Csoregi [:nataliaCs]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/releases/mozilla-beta/rev/aca73ccfac91

Comment 9

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

We should add this to the nightly and beta release notes.

Beta 64:
Address Bar restriction characters changed: you can match on urls using the "$" character, instead of "@". You can restrict resuts to search suggestions using the "?" character, instead of "$".

Nightly 65: 
Address Bar restriction characters changed: it is no more possible to restrict results to typed urls ("~").

Comment 10

[Timea Zsoldos [:zstimi/tzsoldos], Desktop QA]

I have reproduced this issue using Firefox  64.0a1(2018.10.17) on Win 10 x64.
I can confirm this issue is fixed, I verified using Firefox 64.0b9 and 65.a1 on Win 10 x64, Ubuntu 18.04 x64 and Mac OS X 10.13.6.
This bug changed 2 of the characters, in particular "$" used to restrict to search suggestions, now we use "?". "@" used to restrict a match to only url (search urls not titles), now we use "$".

Comment 11

[Julien Cristau [:jcristau]]

Added to the draft relnotes, will eventually end up on mozilla.org.