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Blocklists download/update doesn't work

Open BlackRock-99 opened this issue 1 year ago • 15 comments

The process of downloading/updating blockilists is constantly stuck, the "downloading" circle animation goes on for 1 hour now without any changes. On 2 different phones.

Could this be fixed?

Is there something wrong going on with the blocklist sources?


Update 30 minutes later:

  • The phone where the update was running got an on-screen message "something went wrong, try again later" and the update stopped.
  • On the phone where the download was running, the download just stopped.

Something is certainly wrong.

BlackRock-99 avatar Jul 22 '23 01:07 BlackRock-99

Are you from China / Turkmenistan? Some countries block rethinkdns servers, so downloads won't succeed: https://github.com/celzero/rethink-app/issues/293

If not, consider toggling Use in-app downloader (from DNS -> Configure -> Advanced) to see if the blocklist download then works?

If not, and if you know how, can you share the output from adb logcat as you attempt a new download (which fails)?

ignoramous avatar Jul 28 '23 00:07 ignoramous

Are you from China / Turkmenistan?

No I'm not from any of the countries where the servers could b blocked

If not, consider toggling Use in-app downloader (from DNS -> Configure -> Advanced) to see if the blocklist download then works?

Trying right now, will post the result whether it worked or not. It's running 10 minutes with "download in progress" so far


In any case, this is very strange, the download has been working before.

I have Rethink running in always-on & lockdown modes, Download Manager is not blocked in the firewall, so all should be working..

BlackRock-99 avatar Aug 05 '23 16:08 BlackRock-99

If not, consider toggling Use in-app downloader (from DNS -> Configure -> Advanced) to see if the blocklist download then works?

Took a while, but the download was successful, thanks for the workaround.

Wondering, why it doesn't work with Download Manager? It is not blocked and has internet access

BlackRock-99 avatar Aug 05 '23 16:08 BlackRock-99

Wondering, why it doesn't work with Download Manager? It is not blocked and has internet access

Do you have the setting Use in-app downloader turned ON or OFF? If it is turned OFF, then Android's built-in Download Manager is what's working.

ignoramous avatar Aug 05 '23 17:08 ignoramous

Now I have it ON now, after your advice, and it worked.

So, wondering why it doesn't work with Download Manager while it is not blocked and has internet access, it worked before.

BlackRock-99 avatar Aug 05 '23 17:08 BlackRock-99

So, wondering why it doesn't work with Download Manager while it is not blocked and has internet access, it worked before.

My guesses are:

  1. Your device is on a custom ROM that has a broken Download Manager.
  2. Your device is on latest and greatest Android version we haven't yet tested Rethink on.
  3. There's a bug in the way Rethink uses the Download Manager (unlikely).
  4. Rethink downloads are blocked either by the ISP or the router or something.

ignoramous avatar Aug 05 '23 17:08 ignoramous

1 and 2 sound doubtfully: I have Graphene and /e/ on my phones, 4 the same, cause the result is the same on different networks in 2 different european countries..

BlackRock-99 avatar Aug 05 '23 18:08 BlackRock-99

Graphene and /e/ might have a subtly broken Download Manager... Very likely.

If you are technical enough, can you share adb logcat output as you attempt to download using the built-in Download Manager?

ignoramous avatar Aug 05 '23 19:08 ignoramous

Looks like we've run into a issue when the VPN is in lockdown mode and the 'Use in-app downloader' is turned off. Essentially, the Android download manager isn't kicking off downloads when this happens.

@A-7666, To double-check, if you start a download in lockdown mode and then try turning off the lockdown mode, the download manager will kickstart the pending download: #983

hussainmohd-a avatar Aug 17 '23 14:08 hussainmohd-a

@hussainmohd-a , oh ok. Strange, cause I don't recall it to be the case before. If I remember correctly, the blocklists on my other phone (which is now dead) were from 2022.12, maybe this is when this issue appeared in Rethink.

@ignoramous , Well I haven't noticed any issues with is other than with Rething blocklists so far. Regarding the adb log, I can't do in in the near future sadly :-/

BlackRock-99 avatar Aug 31 '23 20:08 BlackRock-99

Hey, same issue here

I have a logcat of the problem http://0.vern.cc/E4.png

iambeingtracked avatar Sep 01 '23 20:09 iambeingtracked

I have a logcat of the problem http://0.vern.cc/E4.png

Thanks. Looks like Rethink on your Android does not have access to read from / write to the Downloads folder? Rethink does request this permission, may be it has been revoked or not granted?

ignoramous avatar Sep 01 '23 23:09 ignoramous

Exactly, it does not request the permission https://files.wherelinux.xyz/all-files-permissions.jpg

iambeingtracked avatar Sep 02 '23 10:09 iambeingtracked

Exactly, it does not request the permission https://files.wherelinux.xyz/all-files-permissions.jpg

You're right.

Unsure why WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE permission was removed in this commit: https://github.com/celzero/rethink-app/commit/a9b1fe45213a1dff84b0e64f35ecf2bd73d9c8de

ignoramous avatar Sep 02 '23 12:09 ignoramous

I downloaded Rethinkdns through fdroid on my Galaxy S20 (official ROM but debloated a bit) yesterday and wanted to manage blocklists, but the initial download would not do anything. Resetting the app wouldn't work either. The workaround then was to enable in-app downloader and suddenly it worked. I dont recall having had these problems, the last time I hat to install the app in February.

What I noticed was, when I decided to stop the download that was going nothing and subsequently turned off the vpn, the download manager suddenly started downloading the files. This happens every time the blocklist download is started, aborted and the vpn stopped afterwards. But even if the download with deactivated vpn succeeded for all the files, the app couldn't work with that and started the process from scratch.

Why is vpn on even required for the blocklists to download? It seems like that was what prevented the download in the first place.

npahakis avatar Jun 26 '24 10:06 npahakis