[arch-dev-public] Potential removal of Chromium in ~2 months

[Dave Reisner]

On Sat, Feb 22, 2020 at 07:50:58AM +0200, Evangelos Foutras via arch-dev-public wrote:
> Just a quick heads up that I am considering dropping Chromium from
> [extra] a week or two before the Chromium 82 stable release (~April 28).
> The reason for this is that our API keys no longer work for geolocation
> requests and there is no clear upstream guidance on how to resolve this
> issue. [1]

We've talked about this. You're well aware that this isn't an accurate
portrayal of the situation. I'm happy to guide you (or anyone else)
through the remedy. What you're looking for is continuation of the
preferential treatment that distros have historically received and
unfortunately, that avenue has changed shape. Your gripe seems to be
focused on the requirement of having a billing account now, regardless
of the fact that the end goal is the same -- for distros (non-profits)
to have free access.

> When I created these API keys back in 2013, there was a semi-official
> effort by the Chrome Team to support distro builds of Chromium in regard
> to accessing Google APIs; a few minor hiccups along the way were quickly
> resolved. I feel this arrangement is starting to fall apart (in spite of
> some upstream Chrome developers' best efforts).
> 
> To make a long story short, I consider broken geolocation sufficient
> reason for removal. I don't mind it being broken for my own use, but
> shipping a package with broken functionality due to lack of upstream
> support does not sit well with me.

The short story doesn't accurately reflect reality. There's still upstream
support, you've just not been willing to conform to the new officially
supported process.

> To protect against systems with outdated Chromium (following the stable
> release of version 82), at the beginning of April I intend to post a
> news item about the need to switch to another browser. That is assuming
> no solution is found and nobody objects to the removal or wishes to
> continue maintenance of the package with reduced functionality.

If anyone wants help in getting Geolocation working again, please let me
know.

dR