1758097 - News message is not displayed if earlier accessed by direct URI before subscribing to group

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(MailNews Core :: Networking: NNTP, defect)

Description

[max]

Steps to reproduce:

I was checking if the latest thunderbird versions are affected by the Bug #1752806 that I faced with thunderbird-91. Daily build was severely broken that time, with beta 97 I met the following bug that is still reproducible with version 99 daily builds. The steps are the same as I earlier posted in Bug #1752806 comment #5.

• Ensure a clean profile mkdir -p ~/profile/tb-news-daily/
• thunderbird/thunderbird --profile ~/profile/tb-news-daily
• Since that moment I suspected particular message (later I realized it is necessary to repeat save attachment for the same message) I tried to open it directly: thunderbird/thunderbird --profile ~/profile/tb-news-daily 'news://news.gmane.io:119/f0597d96-a287-2c48-7897-6b8737c95217%40posteo.eu' Notice that Message-ID in URI must have @ encoded as %40, so Bug #1756126 may be related to some confusion of @ and %40 in internal caches. The URI must not have group name otherwise thunderbird will send group-name/Message-ID as article ID instead of just Message-ID.
• Reject startup wizard
• Create a news account for news.gmane.io
• Notice that first attempt to open the message from CLI must be before subscribing to the news group
• Subscribe to gmane.emacs.orgmode
• download 500 messages
• type "add support for" in quick filter
• select the message that starts the thread [PATCH] Add support for $…$ latex fragments followed by a dash 1/24/22 4:42 PM, Sébastien Miquel. alternatively you may open the message using the command with direct URI specified above

Actual results:

Message pane appears blank

Expected results:

Message is rendered, so it is possible to read it.

Related issue: Bug #1756132 to display arbitrary message from a NNTP server independently if the user subscribed to particular newsgroup and whether the message headers has been received earlier.

Comment 1

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

ping, can you reproduce this?

Comment 2

[Ping Chen [:rnons] (away)]

open it directly: thunderbird/thunderbird --profile ~/profile/tb-news-daily 'news://news.gmane.io:119/f0597d96-a287-2c48-7897-6b8737c95217%40posteo.eu'

This doesn't work for me on either 91 or daily, the app exits immediately. Can you give me a version number so I can reproduce?

Comment 3

[max]

(In reply to Ping Chen (:rnons) from comment #2)

open it directly: thunderbird/thunderbird --profile ~/profile/tb-news-daily 'news://news.gmane.io:119/f0597d96-a287-2c48-7897-6b8737c95217%40posteo.eu'

This doesn't work for me on either 91 or daily, the app exits immediately. Can you give me a version number so I can reproduce?

The command exits immediately and it is expected. Do you have another instance of thunderbird running at this moment? If so you should try to change class or name of the application e.g. by adding additional --class ThunderbirdBug1758097 to all commands.

With thunderbird-91.7.0 I can not reproduce the issue as well. In response to the command additional window with the message is created.

I have thinderbird-100.0a1 2022-03-13 and I see the issue with this version. Originally I have tried thunderbird-97.0b3 almost certainly downloaded on 2022-01-31. I filed this bug on 2022-03-04, so I had 99a1 version from that date or several days before. Unfortunately I removed archives with daily builds.

So despite the command exits, it creates a blank message window. My expectation that the message should be displayed even without accounts and subscriptions, so I filed Bug 1756132.

I have realized that if I exactly follow the steps to reproduce than I am unable to create account at all. More precise order

• mkdir -p ~/profile/tb-news-daily/
• thunderbird/thunderbird --profile ~/profile/tb-news-daily
• create an account for news.gmane.io but do not subscribe
• thunderbird/thunderbird --profile ~/profile/tb-news-daily 'news://news.gmane.io:119/f0597d96-a287-2c48-7897-6b8737c95217%40posteo.eu'
• close the appeared blank message window
• subscribe to gmane.emacs.orgmode
• download 1000 messages since enough new articles appeared in the group since the beginning of the month.
• find the following message: [PATCH] Add support for $…$ latex fragments followed by a dash 1/24/22 4:42 PM, Sébastien Miquel
• it does not displayed in the 3-pane tab

Comment 4

[Ping Chen [:rnons] (away)]

I see, when you run thunderbird news://url, you already have a tb window open. The blank msg window is related to https://searchfox.org/comm-central/rev/fd6e9e3bf40d04689eaa0fa9b20c1926be5f9843/mail/base/content/messageWindow.js#556. Seems in other places we pass msgHdr to msg window and it works. For message uri, I don't know, it's possible this has been broken for quite some time.

I have realized that if I exactly follow the steps to reproduce than I am unable to create account at all.

I can reproduce this only if I skip the third step create an account for news.gmane.io but do not subscribe. I will fix this.

But when I do the third step, so the account is already created, I can't reproduce the rest of the bug. The message is displayed fine. I think an easier way to reproduce is,

1. create a news account, do not subscribe
2. create a draft containing a news url, e.g. news://news.mozilla.org/[e-mail]
3. click the news url to load the message
4. subscribe to the group that contains the message, e.g. mozilla.test
5. find and click the message, loads fine for me.

Comment 5

[Ping Chen [:rnons] (away)]

Attachment: Bug 1758097 - Create a news account if not already exist when loading news url. r=mkmelin

Previously only an nntp server is created to load a news url, the presence of the server prefs prevents user from creating a news account manually.

Comment 6

[max]

(In reply to Ping Chen (:rnons) from comment #4)

I can reproduce this only if I skip the third step create an account for news.gmane.io but do not subscribe. I will fix this.

If I try to open the message from command line before I create account then "next" button in the wizard is disabled (I guess, since the server is already created). It would be great if you fix such issue, but I was trying to report another bug.

But when I do the third step, so the account is already created, I can't reproduce the rest of the bug. The message is displayed fine. I think an easier way to reproduce is,

1. create a news account, do not subscribe
2. create a draft containing a news url, e.g. news://news.mozilla.org/[e-mail]
3. click the news url to load the message

I can reproduce my issue with my scenario and the message from news.mozilla.org, but if I am trying to follow your steps then in response to click I get:

NS_ERROR_FAILURE: Component returned failure code: 0x80004005 (NS_ERROR_FAILURE) [nsIMsgFolder.getChildNamed] 2 NntpMessageService.jsm:147
    _decomposeNewsMessageURI resource:///modules/NntpMessageService.jsm:147
    messageURIToMsgHdr resource:///modules/NntpMessageService.jsm:66

for both @ and %40 in the URI.

4. subscribe to the group that contains the message, e.g. mozilla.test
5. find and click the message, loads fine for me.

I can confirm that it can be opened from the group or from the command line at this step, but the original bug is that it impossible to read the message.

Comment 7

[max]

To be precise, I am testing inside an isolated minimal LXC container, it has access to the XWindow socket, but not to d-bus one, so thunderbird does not have access to full desktop integration.

Comment 8

[Phabricator Automation]

Comment on attachment 9268382 [details]
Bug 1758097 - Create a news account if not already exist when loading news url. r=mkmelin

Revision D141446 was moved to bug 1760393. Setting attachment 9268382 [details] to obsolete.

Comment 9

[Ping Chen [:rnons] (away)]

I wonder if you can still reproduce this on Daily. I tested with an empty profile and news://news.mozilla.org/[e-mail] just now, seems to work for me.

Comment 10

[max]

With thinderbird-101.0a1 I can not reproduce the issue as well. I stressed that %40 must be used instead of @, but it seems, currently both variants displays the message prior to subscription while earlier blank window was shown before subscription. After subscription message remains available and both variants of the link still work as well.

It is great that now thunderbird is able to display arbitrary message by its Message-ID and subscription is not required. The next step should be support of links that include newsgroup name news://news.mozilla.org/mozilla.test/[e-mail].

Thank you for the fix.

Comment 11

[Ping Chen [:rnons] (away)]

Good, I think you have another bug that tracks supporting more news url patterns, let's close this first.