973021 - Remove m.foo.com -> foo.com RDS hack

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox for Android Graveyard :: General, defect)

Description

[Brian Nicholson (:bnicholson)]

When using Request Desktop Site, we have a basic algorithm that tries to purge as much as possible from the URL to guarantee that we aren't stuck on a mobile site: http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/mobile/android/chrome/content/browser.js#2989. This hack is in place to address complaints that other browsers face, which is that RDS doesn't seem to do anything on many mobile sites (because a mobile URL still shows a mobile page, regardless of the UA).

Although it increases the success rate of switching from a mobile to desktop page, it results in the user being moved to the root of that domain (foo.com/a/b/c -> foo.com). Aside from the fact that users are moved to a different page than the one they were viewing, the root domain may not be meant for viewing, resulting in an error page. Additionally, this hack won't work for sites that don't follow the "m." prefix convention; e.g., i.reddit.com or mobile.twitter.com.

While we haven't received many complaints that I know of, this approach is an ugly hack that can break things, so this is more of an add-on territory.

Comment 1

[Brian Nicholson (:bnicholson)]

Attachment: Remove Request Desktop Site URL rewrite hack

Comment 2

[Brian Nicholson (:bnicholson)]

https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/fx-team/rev/267e352db60c

Comment 3

[Phil Ringnalda (:philor)]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/267e352db60c