[Phpmyadmin-devel] GSoC Project - AJAX Error Reporting
Rouslan Placella
rouslan at placella.com
Sat Apr 20 21:32:12 CEST 2013
On 04/20/2013 08:24 PM, Abhishek Kandoi wrote:
>
> On Sat, Apr 20, 2013 at 11:34 PM, Rouslan Placella <rouslan at placella.com
> <mailto:rouslan at placella.com>> wrote:
>
> On 04/20/2013 04:29 PM, Abhishek Kandoi wrote:
> > There was something I wanted to know about.
> > Would it be better to show an alert on the client side when an error
> > which can impact the client side system occurs?
> > Or as per my opinion we can simply create a custom modal box to show
> > only those errors which affect the client-side system badly in a
> simple
> > yet nice manner. Something like "Ops something went wrong, it may
> affect
> > your working. Want to send a detailed error report to the
> developers of
> > phpMyAdmin".
>
> Dialogs for this feature should not be modal as, IMO, that would be too
> intrusive.
>
>
> Got it, this would disrupt their working and may even make a bad
> impression of intrusion.
>
>
>
> > This way we can get a detailed report from the user for really bad
> > errors. Hence helping our developers to better understand the possible
> > cause of the error, and hence better diagnose it. We can encourage
> > clients to send a bit descriptive error report which may contain what
> > all they did which resulted in a particular error. Tackling and fixing
> > bugs would become easier this way.
> >
> > Also I would request you to refine my idea so that I can set
> particular
> > goals for this project. Some more ideas from your side would be really
> > helpful.
>
> Refining the idea is your job, not ours.
>
>
> Sure, thanks for telling about this.
>
>
>
> Oh, and we use bottom posting on this mailing list...
>
>
> Sorry, but I didn't understand what you want to convey. I am doing it
> wrong? Please guide me if yes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Bottom-posting
> Ok, so here is what I have thought this far.
>
> The client-side system would be behaving in the background without any
> disturbance to the client. The client-side system will send any Ajax
> Related error to our server-side system where the error will be stored
> in a database according to its type and the predicted level of problem
> that it can cause to the client-side system. Errors reported will
> contain no information about the client hence protecting their privacy.
> It would also be devoid of any kind of sensitive information which could
> possibly be hacked over a network hence removing the need for an
> encryption system.
>
> At the server-side there would be a web-interface that will allow
> phpMyAdmin developers to diagnose errors related to Ajax. The system
> will provide all the information related to an error for the developers
> to look upon (I would be documenting both the client and server-side
> error system at the end of the GSoC). The documentation will also
> provide some information related to common errors that may occur on the
> client-side, thus helping them in the process of diagnosis.
>
> The server-side web-interface would comprise of a simple left-side
> navigation menu for easy access to various locations on the website. The
> home screen would provide an overview of the recent errors that were
> added to the database and latest discussion by various developers on
> popular errors. Then there would be a functionality to directly forward
> bug reports to the phpMyAdmin bug tracker. Also as suggested on the
> ideas page there would be a functionality to search the database for
> specific types of errors based on their type, how frequently they occur.
> Moreover I was thinking of a small wiki for the error system so that a
> developer who has figured out the cause of a particular error can then
> document the problem to help others in fixing similar errors. This way
> other developers will be able to search the wiki for errors similar to
> one they are working on based on some tags(maybe), and hence fix them
> without loss of valuable time.
>
> What do you think about it? Please comment.
>
Not sure we need the wiki, which is yet another system to maintain, as
we have a bug tracker.
> Bye,
> Rouslan
>
> > On Tue, Apr 16, 2013 at 3:15 AM, Rouslan Placella
> <rouslan at placella.com <mailto:rouslan at placella.com>
> > <mailto:rouslan at placella.com <mailto:rouslan at placella.com>>> wrote:
> >
> > On 04/15/2013 07:16 PM, Abhishek Kandoi wrote:
> > > Hi Rouslan,
> > >
> > > Thanks for replying. I was unable to reply properly using my
> > SourceForge account.
> > I have worked with a few mailing lists like Google Groups,
> but this
> > one seemed different to me.
> > I didn't even get emails when you people replied on this thread
> > because I had my Digest Mode On,
> > thus I didn't have an option to Reply to All.
> > >
> > > I will be formatting manually for this time only, as I have no
> > email to reply to.
> > (Didn't wanna spoil the reply format)
> > >
> > > Rouslan Placella wrote:
> > >
> > >> Hi Abhishek,
> > >>
> > >> have you got a live demo of this application that I could try?
> > >
> > > Yes, you can try it online at
> > http://faceinbook.co.nr/flowork/home.html.
> >
> > Out of curiosity, was the app a college project?
> >
> > Also, I would like to hear from you about what you think are the
> > shortcomings of your implementation. Would you do anything
> differently
> > if you had to do it again from scratch?
> >
> > >> From your email, I'm getting the feeling that you didn't fully
> > >> understand where the different components of the system will
> > reside...
> > >
> > > Yeah, I got it a bit wrong on the first go. But on reading the
> > idea again I understood
> > what exactly it is about.
> > >
> > >
> > >> The server-side component of this system will not be for
> the users of
> > >> phpMyAdmin or administrators of individual phpMyAdmin
> > installations, it
> > >> will, instead, be used by the members of the phpMyAdmin
> development
> > >> team[0] to globally diagnose issues.
> > >
> > > I thought a client-side component for handling errors as well as
> > one for
> > diagnosing issues was suggested. But actually the suggestion
> was for a
> > client-side
> > component for sending errors to a server-side component with
> the data
> > containing
> > nothing that concerns the user about his/her privacy. Thus
> there is no
> > need of encryption
> > as you said, because the data contains no sensitive information.
> > >
> > >
> > > And also as you wrote that there is no means to check if a
> request
> > is valid,
> > and hence no need for checking for authentication.
> > >
> > >
> > > I would be happy to implement what you suggested about
> restricting
> > the number
> > of requests per IP to prevent the defacing of the
> server-system. Also I
> > will be
> > more than pleased to work on the server-side part to allow the
> > phpMyAdmin developers
> > to analyze and diagnose the errors.
> > >
> > >
> > > Also to prevent the back-end from attacks such as DoS you
> > suggested a global limit
> > on the number of requests. It seems easy to implement but will
> play an
> > important role
> > against DoS attacks.
> > >
> > >
> > > I will reply back after I work out a plan for the server-side
> > interface
> > and functioning for comments from you all.
> > >
> > >
> > > Rouslan Placella wrote:
> > >
> > >> The wiki is pretty comprehensive on the matter. Do you have
> a more
> > >> specific question?
> > >
> > > Yes, is there a place where I can upload a draft of my
> application
> > for my mentor to review it? If not, is posting it to the mailing
> > list fine?
> >
> > Not that I know of. You can post to the mailing list, but your
> draft
> > will be visible to other gsoc candidates.
> >
> > Bye,
> > Rouslan
>
>
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