1249097 - Bing search engine can never be installed

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(addons.mozilla.org Graveyard :: Administration, defect)

Description

[Mike Kaply [:mkaply] (PTO until Sept 14)]

There is a Bing search engine here:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/bing/

But because we bundle Bing in Firefox, it can never actually be installed. It simply errors out:

Firefox could not install the search plugin from "https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/downloads/latest/10434/addon-10434-latest.xml?src=search" because an engine with the same name already exists.

(I have no idea how it has so many weekly downloads)

This seems like a bad user experience because it simply doesn't work.

Can we just remove it?

Comment 1

[Jorge Villalobos [:jorgev] (he/him)]

The list of search engines available in the drop down vary by region, I think, so that could be one reason. It's also possible to remove it and then install it again from AMO. Same goes for the Google, DuckDuckGo and Yahoo! search add-on on AMO.

I agree that the install experience isn't great, but that's a client-side bug, not an AMO bug.

Comment 2

[Mike Kaply [:mkaply] (PTO until Sept 14)]

Unfortunately removing them from Firefox doesn't actually remove them, it just hides them and you still get an error when you install.

I wonder if AMO could use the "isSearchProviderInstalled" API to make things nicer?

But I agree. This is a really ugly client side message.

Comment 3

[Jorge Villalobos [:jorgev] (he/him)]

(In reply to Mike Kaply [:mkaply] from comment #2)
> Unfortunately removing them from Firefox doesn't actually remove them, it
> just hides them and you still get an error when you install.
> 
> I wonder if AMO could use the "isSearchProviderInstalled" API to make things
> nicer?
> 
> But I agree. This is a really ugly client side message.

Yeah, we now have UX people actually helping us improve things, so I suggest you file an issue here: https://github.com/mozilla/addons-server/issues/new

I don't think there's anything to do from the Administration side, and most AMO bug modules are now being handled on GitHub.