Affected versions:

• Fx70.0b13

Affected platforms:

• windows 10
• ubuntu 18.04
• macOS 10.14, macOS 10.15

Steps to reproduce:

1. Launch Firefox.
2. Go to twitter, log in and save the account details from the displayed doorhanger.
3. Click the recommendation blue button and then on 'Turn on sync'.
4. Click the Sign In button from the page page where you were re-directed.
5. Follow the steps to create a new account.

Expected result:

• The user is required a code to verify the account and the end of its creation.

Actual result:

• The user is informed that a verification link has been sent to the specified email.

Regression range:

• Not sure this is a regression as it's part of a new feature.

Additional notes:

• According to the latest information, the user should be redirected to the new sign-in page and flow (like when trying to sign-in from the avatar button).
• Please note that the same issue occurs when the user goes to: hamburger menu -> what's new -> 'Firefox now fights harder for your privacy' and clicks on 'Get a Firefox account' link.

Updating the title to reflect the fact that a verification code is expected instead of a verification link.

Assuming this needs to be in 70, we either need a patch asap today or I will need to do an RC2 build later this week (which I'd like to avoid)

(In reply to Liz Henry (:lizzard) from comment #2)

Assuming this needs to be in 70, we either need a patch asap today or I will need to do an RC2 build later this week (which I'd like to avoid)

Changing from a link to a code doesn't require a Firefox patch, only an FxA server side config change.

Great. I'll just track to make sure that happens, then.

Per Vijay, this is dev complete and is in FxA train 148 to ship to Prod on 21 October 2019.

Can this ship before 21 October so we can test and verify before then? Thanks!

Hey :lizzard, this is actually available in FxA stage environment so could be verified there before Oct 21. If QA needs to verify against production, we are expecting it to be there Monday Oct 21.

Let me know if you want instructions to test on stage.

Yes can you put instructions for QA here in the bug please?

Cristian, can you test tonight with the staging environment? Thanks!

Hey Cristian,

There are a couple ways to test this on stage. You can update your about:config prefs

identity.fxaccounts.autoconfig.uri : https://accounts.stage.mozaws.net/ then restart the browser. Or you can use [1] and start Firefox with the stage profile.

[1] - https://github.com/vladikoff/fxa-dev-launcher#firefox-accounts-custom-profiles-for-firefox

I have re-tested this on the latest beta version Fx70.0b14.
Please note that the issue occurs even when using the stage environment as instructed. I have noticed that the link on the sign-in page has changed to stage (https://accounts.stage.mozaws.net/signin?service=sync&context=fx_desktop_v3&entrypoint=preferences), but its flow is not different than the reported one.
Also it's the same behavior when clicking on 'Get a Firefox Account' from the Mozilla Release Notes page.

Hey :cbaica,

Can you please send a video of the steps you are using ? The sign-in link is expected to change since you are using stage servers.

Here is a video of me following your original steps on the Fxa stage servers [1] with the issue resolved.

[1] - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bSkecG7ETtNg5HFpCk_ftgMFRIcjnwIx/view?usp=sharing

I am unable to repro using FF 71.0a1

From conversation with Alex Davis, not a blocker for 70. I'll let him add the details.

Blocker or not, this is fixed based on comment 12 and comment 13. I'm going to close it -- @cbaica if you can still reproduce though please let us know.

Re-marking this as a blocker though. Because, we need to know the status for 70 not 71. And, if it's blocking account creation I think that is pretty serious.

On FF 70 I followed these steps: user goes to: hamburger menu -> what's new -> 'Firefox now fights harder for your privacy' and clicks on 'Get a Firefox account' link.
Expected result: verification code
Actual result: email verification

Re-marking this as a blocker though. Because, we need to know the status for 70 not 71. And, if it's blocking account creation I think that is pretty serious.

I'll wait for engineering to chyme in but it should have nothing to do with 70 vs 71 since it was fixed on the FxA staging.

I want to be clear that this does not block account creation. Sending links rather than codes is the user flow we've had on FxA forever. We're just moving people over to codes and away from links to simplify our flows.

Additional note:
If links were to be deprecated this would be a problem but links will not be deprecated and will continue to work because there are flows for which we cannot migrate to codes.
For example, email confirmation reminder emails (sent 2 days and 7 days after registration) will continue to use links since the user will likely have closed the form to enter the code from the original email we sent to confirm their email.

On the staging server, I can confirm that creating a new account and enabling sync from about:preferences#sync, using FF70 sends a code, not a link.

Closing for verification based on comment 20

In reply to comment 12. Re-tested following your steps from the video. I can confirm that for staging, the codes are sent.
Marking this as verified fixed for Fx70.0b14 on windows, macOS and ubuntu 18.04.
Please note that for the 'Get a Firefox Account' link that is still not the case, even though I've set the staging server.

This bug has been identified as part of a pilot on determining root causes of blocking and dot release drivers.

It needs a root-cause set for it. Please see the list at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FFEGsmoU8T0N8R9kk-MXWptOPtXXXRRIe4vQo3_HgMw/.

Add the root cause as a whiteboard tag in the form [rca - <cause> ] and remove the rca-needed keyword.

If you have questions, please contact :tmaity.

For this bug, the root cause was a logical error with how FxA created the experiment for the signup code experiment. The bug was fixed on the FxA server in this PR [1].

Notes from bug:

The main issue found here is that the signup code experiment does not get created when you goto the Sign In page. When users sign-in with an unknown account, they are given an option to create the account.

We currently, don't populate an account object when going from Sign-in -> Sign-up, this removes the check and starts the experiment. I'm hesitant to make bigger changes since I know this code will be removed.

[1] - https://github.com/mozilla/fxa/pull/2887