670451 - OpenSearch "language" and MozSearch moz:language parameters shouldn't use UI locale

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Firefox :: Search, defect)

Description

[Reşat SABIQ (Reshat)]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 5.1; rv:5.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/5.0
Build ID: 20110615151330

Steps to reproduce:

Searched from search bar using Google


Actual results:

Locale code from general.useragent.locale was indicated in the URL as part of HTTP param rls.


Expected results:

User's most preferred locale should be used instead (based on Accept-Language (and navigator.language)).

P.S. I'm reporting against FX 5, but suspect the same is true for Trunk.

Comment 1

[Reşat SABIQ (Reshat)]

Completely dropping rls HTTP param is an equally good, and perhaps even a better solution. It still appears that the code changes in this bug would be separate from bug 670450, but if needed the 2 bugs can be merged.

Comment 2

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

This is not a core issue.  The HTTP implementation does NOT decide what urls to load.

Comment 3

[Henrik Skupin [:whimboo][⌚️UTC+1]]

I'm not sure what this rls param is used for. Kev can you help out?

Comment 4

[Kev Needham [:kev]]

The "rls" attribute is used by Google affiliates, of which Mozilla is one. The locale included in this attribute has no bearing on the content returned by queries to Google, and is included for reporting.

Comment 6

[Reşat SABIQ (Reshat)]

For the record and clarity: the issue reported here is distinct from bug 670450 in that the locale code used in search URL (when searching from search bar) is a dynamic value and comes from from general.useragent.locale pref (whereas in 670450 it's a build-time value, that doesn't appear to be based on any pref). From my viewpoint, it's OK to fix 2 in 1, just want to make sure people are aware that there are 2 distinct behaviors and 2 places to fix.

P.S. The search bar URL used to be based on a chrome pref in 3.6 and earlier, but no longer is, AFAIK.

Comment 7

[:Gavin Sharp [email: [e-mail]]]

Ah yes, this is indeed a separate issue. This is about the OpenSearch "locale" dynamic parameter.

Comment 8

[Reşat SABIQ (Reshat)]

Searches from a) search bar, b) context menu, and c) location bar behave equivalently, and probably require a change in only 1 place.

P.S. a) and b) are known to reveal UI locale (general.useragent.locale) when the selected search engine is Google. c) as of now appears to always be using Google.
P.P.S. All 3 variations listed here reflect changes to general.useragent.locale immediately (no app re-start required for a), b), and c)).

Comment 9

[Reşat SABIQ (Reshat)]

Two points as an FYI.

1. Ubuntu-provided Firefox doesn't reveal UI locale for Google searches. The following is the complete list of params Ubuntu's OpenSearch config for Google search plugin contains for text/html GET requests:
  <Param name="client" value="ubuntu"/>
  <Param name="channel" value="fs"/>
  <Param name="q" value="{searchTerms}"/>
  <Param name="ie" value="utf-8"/>
  <Param name="oe" value="utf-8"/>
2. Regarding the other major search plugins (other than Google): Bing, Yahoo, Amazon, eBay, Twitter, Wikipedia. None of them reveal the UI locale as part of a URL (param).

P.S. The param in Firefox-shipped google.xml a change in or removal of which is being requested in this bug is as follows:
  <Param name="rls" value="{moz:distributionID}:{moz:locale}:{moz:official}"/>

Comment 11

[Mike Kaply [:mkaply]]

The original intention of this MozParam was to return the browser locale. It wasn't used to affect results, it was used to report the UI language of the browser to Google.

So it is working as designed. It currently uses Services.locale.getRequestedLocale();.

It's not used by Google anymore.