Add option to disable app telemetry

[thomasnordquist]

App telemetry is used to automatically detect bugs and measure acceptance. One should be able to disable the telemetry.

See: https://github.com/thomasnordquist/MQTT-Explorer#telemetry

[thomasnordquist]

Moved example telemetry from readme:

{ system: { arch: 'x64', platform: 'darwin' },
  appVersion: '0.0.7',
  events: { HELLO_EVENT: [ 1547714886134 ] },
  now: 1547714886135,
  transactionId: '1767d251-f492-4f2c-aa62-88add3acc26b' }
{ errors:
   [ { time: 1547714887921,
       message: 'He\'s dead Jim!',
       stack:
        'Error: He\'s dead Jim!\n    at ./src/tracking.ts.exports.default (./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:142765:11)\n    at new Promise (<anonymous>)\n    at Object../src/tracking.ts (./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:142764:1)\n    at __webpack_require__ (./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:20:30)\n    at Object../src/index.tsx (./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:142618:1)\n    at __webpack_require__ (./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:20:30)\n    at ../backend/node_modules/charenc/charenc.js.charenc.utf8.stringToBytes (./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:84:18)\n    at ./mqtt-explorer/app/build/bundle.js:87:10' } ],
  now: 1547714887921,
  transactionId: '53bf9aac-e695-40cc-9a81-b1cf3398843d' }

[GregoryEAllen]

I attempted to run this on a machine that has no internet access. The application prints an error and then hangs. It appears related to this. This is an abridged version:

14:27:56.298 › Checking for update 14:27:56.424 › Error: Error: net::ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED could not update due to error [Error: net::ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED] { stack: 'Error: net::ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED', message: 'net::ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED', name: 'Error', source: 'main' } { Error: getaddrinfo ENOTFOUND app-telemetry.t7n.de at GetAddrInfoReqWrap.onlookup [as oncomplete] (dns.js:58:26) errno: 'ENOTFOUND', code: 'ENOTFOUND', syscall: 'getaddrinfo', hostname: 'app-telemetry.t7n.de', request: Writable { _currentUrl: 'https://app-telemetry.t7n.de/app/9b0c8ca04a361eb8160d98c5' }, response: undefined }

[thomasnordquist]

Hello @GregoryEAllen this "error" is to be expected if there is no internet, but I am fairly certain it is not the reason for the crash.

Can you give me more details: which operating system, which software channel (microsoft store / portable exe / snap store / OSX app store / AppImage / AUR) ?

[GregoryEAllen]

AppImage on CentOS 7.5.1804

[thomasnordquist]

I tried to launch the app in a VM without a network card: I used this base image https://www.osboxes.org/centos/#centos-7-1804-info and it did start successfully (with a load of net::ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED error messages). I am not entirely sure if I used the correct cent-os image.

Is there anything special about your setup?

• Window manager?
• Virtualization? (The app is based on electron/chromium and might require graphic acceleration to some degree)
• Maybe a different display server Wayland/Mir (instead of X11)
• Does the MQTT Explorer icon appear in the application bar?

You could try executing export ELECTRON_ENABLE_LOGGING=true (in the same terminal session) before launching the AppImage file.

[GregoryEAllen]

I apologize for hijacking this issue. I thought it was related to the networking issue because that was the only output.

It runs fine on the desktop of my (normally headless) CentOS7 box. That's running the default GNOME3 on X11.

Where I was having trouble was with remote ssh to that machine. I was ssh'd in from a MacOS box with XQuartz (my normal method for using that normally headless box). Setting ELECTRON_ENABLE_LOGGING doesn't add any output.

I was running the Linux version instead of the Mac version because my internet-denied network doesn't have access to the Mac App Store. I later saw that you also provide a dmg. I'm running that and it's working fine.

I don't know why it's not working over remote ssh, but I also don't feel the need to investigate further. Again, I apologize for hijacking this issue with something unrelated. Maybe my comments should be deleted.

[thomasnordquist]

@GregoryEAllen no worries, I'm always happy to get error reports. It helps tremendously maintaining good software quality.

I just remove the whole conversation in a few minutes 😇

[pintman]

It would be great to have telemetry turned off by default or at least ask the user which option to choose. Having telemetry turned on by default may cause a GDPR violation in europe. Maybe you can reconsider the default behavior.

[aniston]

Hello @thomasnordquist , lovely APP, but as @pintman pointed out using Telemetry without users consent will go against the EU GDPR rules even if there is a clear mention that telemetry will be taken (although no mention if only in Error cases or even thru normal usage?).

So the question as the OP dated back end of Jan 2019, is this option implemented as of Nov 2020 ? might be better to keep it off as default and let users turn it on

[1RandomDev]

What MQTT Explorer has telemetry by default and there's no option to turn it off?! Would be great if someone would have told me that before I downloaded it.

[epichub]

the above readme link to #telemetry is not working - the docs does not cover how to turn it off..

[aniston]

the above readme link to #telemetry is not working - the docs does not cover how to turn it off..

@epichub , build it yourself from the source if you have nodejs on your machine, get the source and in src/registerCrashReporter.ts:

• change the http link URL to localhost or comment it out //submitURL: 'http://app-telemetry.t7n.de/app/crash/mqttexplorer',
• also set uploadToServer: false,
• then build or rebuild with yarn build or npm install

hth !