729421 - Google sends the basic mobile homepage instead of their fancy touch-optimized homepage (that Stock/Chrome get)

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(Web Compatibility :: Site Reports, defect)

Description

[Peter Retzer (:pretzer)]

With the new UA-String (bug 721632) Google now sends the desktop version of its homepage to Firefox instead of the touch optimized version its sending to Android stock browser. Before that we recieved a 'light' version of the mobile optimized site (bug 668286), which is not what we want either, I think, but still better than the desktop site.

Comment 1

[Aaron Train [:aaronmt]]

New UA being: 'Mozilla/5.0 (Android; Mobile; rv:13.0) Gecko/13.0 Firefox/13.0a1'

Comment 5

[Sean McArthur [:seanmonstar]]

Attachment: Stock Browser

This is how Google looks from the stock Browser.

Comment 6

[Sean McArthur [:seanmonstar]]

Attachment: Fennec, from global search

If you use the Android global search, and let it send the request to Firefox, you get the desktop version.

Comment 7

[Sean McArthur [:seanmonstar]]

Attachment: Fennec, from Firefox search

If you type a search term into the Awesomebar, and then select Google Search from Firefox's drop down, you get the stripped down mobile Google view.

Comment 9

[Peter Retzer (:pretzer)]

Google now redirects Fennec to their stripped down Mobile site. Is this bug considered FIXED with that or are we aiming for their fancy version? We'll probably want the fancy version, although it seems to be Googles policy to not give that to any browser except Stock/Chrome.

Comment 10

[Aaron Train [:aaronmt]]

(In reply to pretzer from comment #9)
> Google now redirects Fennec to their stripped down Mobile site. Is this bug
> considered FIXED with that or are we aiming for their fancy version? We'll
> probably want the fancy version, although it seems to be Googles policy to
> not give that to any browser except Stock/Chrome.

Google is not redirecting, we are redirecting on searches in the AwesomeScreen [1].

This bug is far from fixed as Google is still sending their desktop website when you input www.google.com.

[1] http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/mobile/locales/en-US/searchplugins/google.xml#18

Comment 11

[Peter Retzer (:pretzer)]

Attachment: Google redirect since June 14th

I'm not talking about the awesomebar search, I know that it's hardcoded. See the screenshot for what I get when typing 'google.com' into the address bar. The day before I still got the desktop version. 
I should mention though that I am based in Germany and thus am redirected to 'google.de' even though I typed 'google.com'. 
Maybe the switch is only live in Germany for now? Can you try navigating to 'google.de' and see what happens?

Comment 12

[Aaron Train [:aaronmt]]

Ah, yes, they are sending the basic mobile site now. I believe we're pushing for the optimal touch-version.

Comment 13

[Peter Retzer (:pretzer)]

(In reply to Aaron Train [:aaronmt] from comment #12)
> I believe we're pushing for the optimal touch-version.

Changing the summary to reflect that. 
This bug is about the homepage (when navigating to www.google.com).

Comment 16

[Aaron Train [:aaronmt]]

As of 08/07, Google is sending us their touch-site!

I'm also confirming that with the (Gonk, like Android) token for B2G, this is also the case too.

Comment 17

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Aaron Train [:aaronmt] from comment #16)
> As of 08/07, Google is sending us their touch-site!
> 
> I'm also confirming that with the (Gonk, like Android) token for B2G, this
> is also the case too.

We're definitely getting a mobile-optimized site, although it's not the same site that Webkit gets. It's a much better situation though that's acceptable.

Comment 18

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

I'll file a followup bug for the Webkit vs. Gecko difference.

Comment 19

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

It appears it this fix on Google's end only works if Android is in the user agent also.

Comment 21

[(no longer active)]

Also, the Google Image search results served to us are very different.  Should this be reopened?

Comment 22

[Jason Smith [:jsmith]]

(In reply to Ehsan Akhgari [:ehsan] from comment #21)
> Also, the Google Image search results served to us are very different. 
> Should this be reopened?

Right. The root cause of that is being tracked in bug 780896. Let's track that there.