1905712 - Temporarily disable geoclue support

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Core :: DOM: Geolocation, task)

Description

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

Geoclue is broken by MLS sunset and we are not properly falling back to GLS. We should disable it until we get a proper fallback.

Comment 1

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

Attachment: Bug 1905712 - Temporarily disable geoclue support r=#dom-core

geoclue can't get location data as it still depends on MLS which is sunsetted in June 12, and navigator.geolocation doesn't respond at all in this case, not even an error code. And we don't fall back to GLS even if Google API key exists.

For now this patch intends to disable geoclue support either until we figure out a fallback strategy or geoclue finds a replacement. Note that this will only help Linux distributions with broken geoclue but not distributions shipping custom Firefox builds without a valid Google API key.

Comment 2

[Pulsebot]

Pushed by [e-mail]:
https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/e396dfbd2f76
Temporarily disable geoclue support r=dom-core,jjaschke

Comment 3

[Chris Peterson [:cpeterson]]

Kagami, since some Linux distros use Firefox ESR, should we uplift this fix to current version ESR 115? Or just let those distros get the fix in Fx 128, the next ESR version? ESR 115.15 will be supported until ESR 128.3 is released on 2024-10-01.

Comment 4

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

Comment on attachment 9410612 [details]
Bug 1905712 - Temporarily disable geoclue support r=#dom-core

Beta/Release Uplift Approval Request

• User impact if declined: Linux users with geoclue enabled will not be able to use Geolocation API and websites that depend on it (maps services)
• Is this code covered by automated tests?: No
• Has the fix been verified in Nightly?: No
• Needs manual test from QE?: Yes
• If yes, steps to reproduce:

1. Open map service e.g. mylocation.org
2. Ask current location (e.g. Browser Geolocation)
3. See if it succeeds

• List of other uplifts needed: None
• Risk to taking this patch: Low
• Why is the change risky/not risky? (and alternatives if risky): Only a flipped pref.
• String changes made/needed:
• Is Android affected?: No

Comment 5

[Emilio Cobos Álvarez (:emilio)]

I have Geoclue and geolocation works using it, so it'd be nice not to regress location accuracy unnecessarily?

Comment 6

[Ryan VanderMeulen [:RyanVM]]

Comment on attachment 9410612 [details]
Bug 1905712 - Temporarily disable geoclue support r=#dom-core

Per discussion in the incident channel, this isn't the route we want to go.

Comment 7

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

Backout reason: geoclue also is used to use GPS device, and simple pref-off will break that.

Comment 8

[Ryan VanderMeulen [:RyanVM]]

Backout: https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/autoland/rev/437e4a10e5fc747e008c6464c252184ec7b2857b

Comment 9

[Iulian Moraru]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/e396dfbd2f76

Comment 10

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

What about the backout?! 👀

Comment 11

[Iulian Moraru]

Backout merged to central: https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/f10a8e621489

Comment 12

[Iulian Moraru]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/f10a8e621489

Comment 13

[Kagami Rosylight [:saschanaz] (they/them)]

We are not planning this anymore and will directly go for bug 1905717.