Hi there!
Lars D. Nood�n wrote:
It depends on what warning or error message the firewall is reporting.
It is a misunderstanding in that there is a world of difference between monitoring all web activity and reporting a crash.
I haven't seen OOo crash (have been using 1.1.4 for OS X heavily), so I can't say what goes on. However, if there isn't already a dialog, then the crash could spawn a dialog asking the user if it is ok to report the bug -- before trying to open any ports.
That�s exactly what is being done. And the dialog also offers the possibility to have a look at the XML document that contains information about the office version and technical data about the crash. The only personal information in that XML document is the users email address which will only be included if explicitly entered and choosen to include for feedback by the user. The default on the checkbox in that dialog for including the email address is to not include it. Besides the XML document some binary data is also being send which could enable a developer to locate the root cause of the problem. The user can also enter a description of what was done before the crash occured. Before the user can select options for crash reporting a message is shown which is explaining everything.
There are at least two problems. One is the misinterpretation of the bug report. Another is the spread of misinformation/urban legend.
Those are really big problems yes. But it�s hard to understand that those occur at all because everything is explained to the user before the crash report is being send. And that a firewall triggers an alarm offering the user to reject or allow an Internet connection for any program not yet configured in the firewall and that it offers the user the possibility to configure a rule for the future and stuff like that is just normal behavior of a firewall. That�s what they are supposed to do.
The text shown to the user before sending the crash report is the following ( see for your self that it is not so easy to misinterpret that as that the application would be sending any collected information other than technical data about the crash )
Welcome to the OpenOffice.org Error Report
This report tool gathers information about how OpenOffice.org is working and sends it to Sun Microsystems to help improve future versions.
It�s easy - just send the report without any further effort on your part by clicking 'Send' in the next dialog, or you can briefly describe how the error occured and then click 'Send'. If you want to see the report, click the 'Show Report' button. No data will be sent if you click 'Do Not Send'.
Customer Privacy
The information gathered is limited to data concerning the state of OpenOffice.org 2.0 when the error occured. Other information about passwords or document contents is not collected.
The Information will only be used to improve the quality of OpenOffice.org and will not be shared with third parties. For more information on Sun Microsystems' privacy policy visit
http://www.sun.com/privacy
Maybe a third is the behavior of the crash report.
I don�t see any misbehavior of the crash reporting process here. The user is explicitly informed with a long message about what is going on and can choose to send or not send the crash report. Misintrepretation of the crash reporting is only possible if people don�t read the text that explains the stuff, than eagerly click on SEND and than wonder about a firewall alarm.
If you see a misbehavior here please explain.
exactly!-Lars Lars Nooden ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) Software patents harm all Net-based business, write your MEP: http://wwwdb.europarl.eu.int/ep6/owa/p_meps2.repartition?ilg=EN
On Thu, 14 Apr 2005, Alexandro Colorado wrote:
This is NOT a missunderstanding OOo DOES look to communicate with Sun Servers
and the firewalls do warn the user about it.
The firewall is doing it's job.
-- Alexandro Colorado Co-Leader of OpenOffice.org Spanish http://es.openoffice.org/
>> [... snip ...]
Kind regards, Bernd Eilers
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