1108570 - Support specifying a minimum version in Firefox OS marketplace listings

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Marketplace Graveyard :: General, defect, P4)

Description

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

I currently say in my description that my app supports Firefox 1.3 and above. But I still sometimes get nailed on reviews negatively because of features that weren't available in Firefox OS 1.1.

In my case with my Khan Academy app, it's MP4 support in v1.1 devices.

> Rated 4 out of 5 stars by Felipe
> Inoperante na versão 1.1, como diz a descrição. A plataforma de aprendizado 
> em si, porém, é bem bacana. Vale a pena ao mínimo testar.

I'd like to ask that the marketplace listing have a minimum supported version field.  

If we can actually physically restrict people from installing if they don't have a matching version, that would be best.  But otherwise, just having a field pulled out from the rest of the description would help.

Comment 1

[Mathieu Pillard [:mat]]

If it's because of mp4 support, we should be able to detect that. In fact we used to but disabled feature detection altogether because of misdetection issues, but we are in the process of re-enabling it for specific sets of features. Maybe MP4 could be part of that.

Comment 2

[Brian R. Bondy [:bbondy]]

Yep mp4 videos just won't play in 1.1.  But having a min supported version in the display would also help.

Comment 3

[Andrew Williamson [:eviljeff]]

(In reply to Mathieu Pillard [:mat] from comment #1)
> If it's because of mp4 support, we should be able to detect that. In fact we
> used to but disabled feature detection altogether because of misdetection
> issues, but we are in the process of re-enabling it for specific sets of
> features. Maybe MP4 could be part of that.

The feature detection API is for 2.0+ (2.1?) only.  Will any kind of feature detection be possible in lower versions?  
Regardless, we do come accross the use-case of needing a hard version limit (normally because of gecko changes rather than gaia) fairly regularly.  I'm not convinced even in 2.0+ we can cover every minor platform change.

Comment 4

[Mathieu Pillard [:mat]]

MP4 detection is not doable using the feature detection API, it has to be done "manually", so, yes, it should be possible in lower versions.

We should really try to avoid versions, it's just messy, unreliable and goes against the idea of having a "web platform".

Comment 5

[Nazar Mokrynskyi]

This should be really resolved ASAP.
I've got multiple 1-star reviews just because people running app on Firefox OS 1.1 (last one about LG Fireweb) while it is explicitly stated that is supports only 1.3+:
https://marketplace.firefox.com/app/cleverstyle-music/
Just don't let them install my app because it will not work anyway!

Intention to avoid version numbers is great, but it doesn't work at all, I have no idea what is wrong with Firefox OS 1.2- and I do not care, just let me specify in addition to capabilities that it requires 1.3+ and I'll be fine.

Also since https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=994638 is not solved and even there was a trial to close it I can't say anything to user, it makes me very angry!

There should be viable solution to resolve such kind of issues.

Comment 6

[David Durst [:ddurst]]

I don't think there's a viable solution to this.

Feature detection is supported in 2.0+. Prior to feature detection, there isn't anything available to MP (afaik) that would identify the version.

This is something we're planning to add in the next release, but even then unless it's a) backported to older versions of the OS and b) users get updates from their operators, I don't see how we could introduce this kind of check and have it work for anyone < 2.0 (hack) or 2.5 (real).

Andrew, Mat - anything I'm missing here?

Comment 7

[Mathieu Pillard [:mat]]

We should really fix bug 994638 first, IMHO.

MP4 support as mentioned in the initial comments might be doable without hasFeature/getFeature (we have MP3/H264 flags, but they are currently always set to True), but reliable *version* detection, not really. Parsing the UA is still possible but that's not what I'd call reliable  https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Gecko_user_agent_string_reference#Firefox_OS_version_number

Comment 8

[Daniele "Mte90" Scasciafratte]

I sue this script that use UA detection https://gist.github.com/Mte90/11087561, i use it in my apps

Comment 9

[Andrew Williamson [:eviljeff]]

Parsing from the gecko version is possible.

The issues mentioned in the initial comment is really an edge case - most of the difficulties apps have are gecko changes between 1.1 and 1.3 that result in broken layout, etc, rather than an API change we could actually detect.

I'm sure in 95% of cases a developer could work around the issue but a) they aren't aware of the issue because they're using modern devices b) don't want to put in the extra development time to support older versions and c) would have a *lot* of difficultly buying a 1.1 now if they were so inclined.

Comment 10

[Daniele "Mte90" Scasciafratte]

Sometimes there are problem for app that use specific parameters in manifest.webapp that are reconized in older version like my app Ringtone Picker.
https://github.com/Mte90/RingTone-Picker-for-FirefoxOS/blob/master/manifest.webapp
The role "system" value not work on 1.2 and minor and the activities used not working also in 1.2 and minor.
The people download my app in Firefox OS 1.2 and rate bad because in their device with 1.1/1.2 not work but i can do nothing other than add an alert on my app but in the meanwhile they have downloaded my app.