Include obfsproxy and fteproxy pluggable transports in tor-browser-build.git

The build of the obfsproxy and fteproxy pluggable transports have not yet been converted to the new build system.

We should decide if we want to keep them, and convert them to the new build system, or if we want to not include them in Tor Browser anymore.

obfsproxy can be replaced by obfs4.

added TorBrowserTeam201708 component::applications/tor browser owner::tbb-team parent::17379 priority::medium resolution::fixed severity::normal status::closed tbb-rbm type::task labels

The number of fte users seems to be quite low: https://metrics.torproject.org/userstats-bridge-transport.html?start=2017-03-07&end=2017-06-05&transport=fte

Trac:
Cc: N/A to dcf

Trac:
Cc: dcf to dcf, mcs

The build of obfsproxy and fteproxy is quite complex as it includes many dependencies, especially for the Windows build where we have to use py2exe with wine, so it will require some work to convert that to the new build system. Given the small number of users, it is not clear that we should spend the time to do it.

dcf, kpdyer: do you have an opinion about this?

Trac:
Cc: dcf, mcs to dcf, mcs, kpdyer

I, of course, would like fte to remain in Tor. However, I don't have any time to devote to converting it to the new build process.

Can you roughly describe the "new" build process? Do we have to keep py2exe? Maybe there's a different/easier way to build fteproxy?

For reference, here are notes from when obfsproxy was ported to the Gitian-based build system initially, in 2013:

• comment:18:ticket:9444 "I'm having trouble making Python work for the Windows bundles."
• comment:19:ticket:9444 "I have a windows build more or less working."
• comment:20:ticket:9444 "These are noteworthy characteristics of the windows pluggable transports build:"

I would prefer to keep FTE in the browser. I know how hard it was to get Python windows builds going, though. As I remember, linux and mac were pretty easy, but Windows was really hard, requiring for example building under Wine (the right version of which was not in deb repositories, etc., etc.).

Currently FTE is only included in the linux and windows builds because of a packaging bug on mac: #18495 (closed) (also #21343 (moved) which removed FTE dependencies from the mac build).

A few users noticed on the blog when FTE disappeared from the mac builds:

• Tor Browser 6.0.3 "How many Pluggable transports are there? The Torproject site shows 'FTE' but I don't have that trnasport."
• Tor Browser 6.0.6 "On a Mac OS transport meek-azure does not work and the transport FTE is stil mising."
• Tor Browser 6.0.7 "It is missing the transport FTE and scramblesuit yet scramblesuit is shown in the Torbrowser."
• Tor Browser 6.5.1 "My Mac's torbrowser does not have the FTE transports ?"

Moving Tickets to July 2017.

Trac:
Keywords: TorBrowserTeam201706 deleted, TorBrowserTeam201707 added

boklm: How much time do you think would cost this conversion? One additional benefit I would see in doing it would be the option to test alpha building with a mixed rbm/Gitian setup before switching to rbm (it seems to me rbm- and Gitian-built bundles should have the same SHA-256 sums in that case). That way we might find harder to spot reproducibility issues while using rbm earlier (if there are any) and in a more controlled fashion.

Trac:
Status: new to needs_information

I am not sure how much time this conversion would take, but maybe it is not that much. Being able to compare builds from rbm and Gitian sounds like a good idea, to make sure nothing was forgotten.

Trac:
Summary: Decide what we want to do with python obfsproxy and fteproxy pluggable transports to Include obfsproxy and fteproxy pluggable transports in tor-browser-build.git

Moving our Tickets to August.

Trac:
Keywords: TorBrowserTeam201707 deleted, TorBrowserTeam201708 added

Trac:
Keywords: N/A deleted, tbb-rbm added

This is done with commits 7ebcf64903bf540504ff96dbe5324284957e1524 and 6221fac747287361a0e4432c3ebf6590461bbbcf.

Trac:
Status: needs_information to closed
Resolution: N/A to fixed

closed

moved to tpo/applications/tor-browser#22499 (closed)