[Release] Perspectives Client 4.6

[Dave Schaefer]

I am ecstatic to announce that Perspectives Client 4.6 has been released!

Version 4.6 is a large release with many features and bug fixes. It is quite possibly Perspectives' biggest update yet!


New Features:
+ Add option to allow or disallow queries when in private browsing (OFF by default; see note below)
+ Improve whitelist interface:
    * Convert whitelist textfield into a table with columns
    + Domain column is sortable
    + Regexes can be clicked and edited
    + Whitelist entries can be clicked to activate or deactivate
    + Table supports multi row selection and removal
* Highly visible notifications when certificates fail (multiple certificates, one not recently seen; multiple certificates)
+ Draw a vertical stale-limit line across notary results
+ Visually indicate cached results in the results dialog
+ Visually indicate whitelisted sites with a different Perspectives icon
+ Expose timeout duration and number of query retries as a user preference
+ Expose maximum caching duration as a user preference



Credit for all of these changes goes to Gerold M., who has done a fantastic job both implementing the code and putting up with my harrowing review process ;) So if you enjoy the features in this release you can thank him. Thanks Gerold!


Note: Possible Action Required
==============================

Perspectives has a new setting to allow or prevent queries when the browser is in Private Browsing mode. This is set to OFF by default - i.e. when Firefox is in private browsing mode no queries will be sent.

Note: If you prefer to allow queries in private browsing mode you will need to enable this feature after you update (the Perspectives icon will also have a tooltip informing you it can be changed). You can change this option in Perspectives Preferences, on the 'Notary Servers' tab.

..


The update has been submitted to the Mozilla Addons site, and will be automatically published once it has been reviewed by the Addons team. You can also download it directly via this link:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/downloads/file/282140/perspectives-4.6-fx+sm.xpi

If you have questions or comments feel free to ask!



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Full release notes:

+ Add option to contact notaries when in private browsing (off by default)
+ Expose timeout duration and number of query retries as a user preference
+ Expose maximum caching duration as a user preference
+ Improve whitelist interface:
    * Convert whitelist textfield into a table with columns
    + Domain column is sortable
    + Regexes can be clicked and edited
    + Whitelist entries can be clicked to activate or deactivate
    + Table supports multi row selection and removal
    + Added localizations (en, de) for columns and remove button
* Highly visible notifications when certificates fail (multiple certificates, one not recently seen; multiple certificates)
* Extract remaining hardcoded strings for localization
* Some German (de) localization fixes
* Convert some alerts to Perspectives wrapped alerts
* Prevent the addition of duplicate notaries
* Correctly detected and set status for "quorum not reached" in non-english languages.
* Temporarily remove all 'Report Attack' functionality, until the feature is fixed
* Check if result signature and timestamps are correct when processing notary results, and visually mark as red if either is incorrect
* Warn on mismatching notary public keys
+ Remove red from color result keys, as it's now used for "invalid signature"
+ Display required quorum duration in notary results
* Rescue the svg/image test page
+ Convert README to markdown file
+ Add more info in README on how to debug and test
+ Draw stale-limit line across notary results
* Remove use of base64.js; entirely replaced by internal browser functions
+ Visually indicate cached results in the results dialog
+ Visually indicate whitelisted entries with a different icon
* Clean up unit tests so many tests are more clear, better organized, and/or easier to maintain
* Refactor test file so more tests can be run without installing the extension (i.e. separate chrome-dependent functionality from non-chrome-dependent functionality)
* Many areas of code cleanup (add hasOwnProperty checks; fix === checks)

[Pavel Malyshev]

Hi Dave.
Are there any plans for SHA1 signatures support?
I found some vendors tend to drop support for MD5 in their certificates...

[Gerold Meisinger]

SHA1 need to be supported in the Perspectives servers first.

Btw: MD5 support was actually dropped in Firefox 32 already but the current server implementation still responds with MD5 signatures. Thus we have to re-calculating them in the Perspectives client first.

[GDR!]

Hello,

Is this release compatible with Firefox 33.0? 

I tried both 4.5.2 and 4.6 and it doesn't look like it's working. It seems to be active and I can change settings, but I've deducted from other messages on this list that there should be an icon somewhere. I don't see that icon, I tried downloading "The Addon Bar" extension too in case Perspectives needs it, but it didn't make the icon appear. 

It doesn't also look like this extension is working, I've visited a sample website with a self-signed cert, https://www.pcwebshop.co.uk/, and I saw the usual warning screen.

[Dave Schaefer]

Hey GDR, thanks for the note.

Perspectives should definitely be working with Firefox 33. The only exception is self-signed certificates. The code for checking self-signed certs changed in Firefox 33 and we've had to adapt to the changes[1]. The great news is that Gerold has already sent a pull request to update the code[2]. Thanks Gerold! I am working to test, merge, and release it ASAP.

>I've deducted from other messages on this list that there should be an icon somewhere

You should definitely see an icon.

I have updated the example screenshots on Perspectives' page on addons.mozilla.org. You can see them here:

1. The icon and menu:
  https://addons.cdn.mozilla.net/user-media/previews/full/147/147404.png

2. The results page:
  https://addons.cdn.mozilla.net/user-media/previews/full/147/147406.png


Previous versions of Perspectives did only display the icon inside the Add-on Bar, but the current version can be displayed almost anywhere you choose. Firefox should let you customize the toolbar to display it where you like.

It could be that Perspectives is installed but the icon is not being displayed on any toolbar. There are instructions on how to customize your Firefox toolbar and make sure the Perspectives icon displays correctly here: http://perspectives-project.org/2012/07/24/how-to-customize-the-browser-toolbar/

Does that help? Do you see a Perspectives icon inside the Customize Toolbar window along with the other available options?


These things combined might be why Perspectives doesn't seem to be working. I'll work to release the self-signed cert fix ASAP. If you get the icon working, does visiting a site with a CA certificate such as https://github.com then work for you?

Cheer, hope that helps!


(PS - Have you by chance installed Perspectives in the past, uninstalled it at some point, and now you're installing it again? Perspectives tries to add itself to the main toolbar when it is first installed. If there are any existing settings, however, it does not modify them and stays where it was last placed. The intent is that Perspectives won't mess with any of your settings if you're not installing it for the first time. So if you have installed it at some point in the past that could explain why the icon wasn't in the expected place.)


[1] https://github.com/danwent/Perspectives/issues/143
[2] https://github.com/danwent/Perspectives/pull/157

[GDR!]

Dave,

Thank you very much for your detailed answer.

It's the first time I've installed Perspectives, and I've used a fresh Firefox profile, too.

Adding the button in Customize menu helped. It looks like Perspectives is now checking for notaries, however the result is always negative (and I'm pretty sure it should be positive, having tried Convergence with the same site on another profile and the notaries agreed). But I guess it's because some notaries from the default list are down.

I've removed all but the 2 working heroku notaries, and it's all good now (except for self-signed certs, but it's as expected - looking forward to a fix). 

Great project!

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[Dave Schaefer]

Not sure if anyone is waiting for Perspectives v4.6 to show up on addons.mozilla.org, but I have received the results of AMO's editorial review for this version. In short - there are several issues they want to be fixed before they will bless v4.6 with full approval. I have created a new tag for this in github, so they can be easily found, followed, and fixed - https://github.com/danwent/Perspectives/labels/blocks_amo_approval

I believe four of these five issues are quick fixes that should be easy to implement. Ticket #59, however, involves migrating all Perspectives preferences from one location to another, and this may not be easy. We will need to write an upgrade script that can properly upgrade everyone's preferences without losing any data.

I will begin investigating these issues in the near future.

On that note - @GDR thank you for the report about the Perspectives icon not appearing. It looks like AMO agrees, and this is one of their issues.

[GDR!]

Oh, great. I must admit it has not been a great first experience with Perspectives, but I'm using it since December and it's working good. Thank you for your work.