289362 - Replace Dictionary.com with Answers.com for dictionary lookup.

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: Search, defect)

Description

[Ben Goodger (use ben at mozilla dot org for email)]

Dictionary.com's abusive policy towards users with respect to advertising and
popups is inconsistent with Firefox's goals. To make things worse, they not only
show popup ads, they maliciously work around Firefox's popup blocker, despite
the fact that we are publicizing their service from our application. 

This must end, and so I am replacing D.c with Answers.com - a simpler, smoother
interface with less obtrusive advertising and no popups. 

Some changes were required to the Internet Search Service to support answer's
query format.

Comment 1

[Ben Goodger (use ben at mozilla dot org for email)]

Attachment: patch

Comment 2

[Ben Goodger (use ben at mozilla dot org for email)]

Chris, let me know when we're good to go on this one.

Comment 3

[Chris Beard]

We're good to go.

Comment 4

[Ben Goodger (use ben at mozilla dot org for email)]

Hi Benjamin - requesting review here, nsInternetSearchService was not handling
search engines whose parameter format included no query string. Answers.com uses:

http://answers.com/<param>

.. this patch updates the installers, bookmarks file, etc. and makes nsISS
handle this query format. 

Comment 5

[Axel Hecht]

This affects the following locales (on trunk, at least):

ar
bg
el
en-GB
es-AR
eu
ga-IE
gu-IN
hu
hy-AM
ja
ja-JP-mac
ko
mn
nl
ro
sk
sq
sv-SE
tr
zh-CN
zh-TW

Luckily, it seems that nobody renamed dictionary.src, so the removal code should
work for localized builds, too.
I shouldn't check the if else + - stuff at 1 am, though.

Comment 6

[Benjamin Smedberg]

Comment on attachment 179892 [details] [diff] [review]
patch

Something is wrong with the bookmarks.html patch (Quicksearch is split across
two lines). Otherwise this looks fine.

Comment 7

[Ben Goodger (use ben at mozilla dot org for email)]

landed branch and trunk. 

Comment 8

[Chase Phillips]

(In reply to comment #7)
> landed branch and trunk. 

This landing broke the tree.

/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/obj/config/nsinstall
-R
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/profile/bookmarks.html
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/profile/localstore.rdf
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/profile/search.rdf
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/profile/unix/mimeTypes.rdf
../../dist/bin/defaults/profile
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/obj/config/nsinstall
-R
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/profile/chrome/userChrome-example.css
/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/profile/chrome/userContent-example.css
../../dist/bin/defaults/profile/chrome
gmake[4]: *** No rule to make target
`/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/searchplugins/answers.src',
needed by `libs'.  Stop.
gmake[4]: Leaving directory
`/builds/tinderbox/Fx-Mozilla1.8/Linux_2.6.12-1.1398_FC4_Depend/mozilla/obj/browser/locales'
gmake[3]: *** [libs] Error 2

Comment 9

[Chase Phillips]

Comment on attachment 179892 [details] [diff] [review]
patch

I'm backing out your check-in in a couple of minutes.  The tree has been busted
for an hour and a half.

Comment 10

[Chase Phillips]

(In reply to comment #9)
> (From update of attachment 179892 [details] [diff] [review] [edit])
> I'm backing out your check-in in a couple of minutes.  The tree has been busted
> for an hour and a half.

Scott suggested a blank answers.src file be added to fix the bustage.  I'm
having him land such on trunk and branch with r+a=[e-mail].

Ben, *watch the tree* after you land your patches to help us keep the tree green
for others.

Comment 11

[Chase Phillips]

Comment on attachment 179892 [details] [diff] [review]
patch

Upon closer inspection, your branch check-in contains at least two extra
patches that apparently were accidentally committed.  One of these was the
channel-prefs.js change which *definitely* shouldn't have gone in yet.

Comment 12

[Axel Hecht]

quicksearch is checked in split, just as is the mozillazine icon in bookmarks.html,
it seems.

Comment 13

[Ben Goodger (use ben at mozilla dot org for email)]

checked in a fix for split lines. 

Comment 14

[Uri Bernstein]

The search plugin sends queries with the wrong encoding - see bug 305756.

Comment 15

[Nick Thomas [:nthomas] (UTC+12)]

mozilla/browser/locales/en-US/searchplugins/dictionary.src was not removed from
CVS, while dictionary.png was.

Comment 16

[richardtallent]

Suggest looking into Wiktionary at some point
(http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Main_Page)

Comment 17

[Rafael Ebron (:rebron)]

Text should read "Answers.com" not "Dictionary".

Should I file a separate bug, Ben or reopen this one?