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BV240 — Preliminary results disclaimer (issue #1350)

Scope

1350 is four independently testable deliverables, not one:

Deliverable Cases
(i) Admin tip copy rewrite + learn_link to the article BV240l–n
(ii) On-ballot notice, visible before the voter casts BV240a–b, f–k
(iii) Extra warning layer for closed-list elections BV240c–d
(iv) Qualify the article's own L26 claim (Matomo path-segment leak) not a UI test — doc review

Status for all 16: Not ready — feature not implemented. These are written to be executed against a local docker compose stack while the PR is in review, then re-run on production after deploy.

Blocked: BV240c and BV240d assert on closed-list wording that hasn't been approved yet (open question Q2 on the ticket). Written here, but don't finalize the expected text until that's settled.

Test elections needed (6 configurations)

All 16 cases run off six small elections. Keep them minimal — 3 candidates, 2–3 ballots. Nothing here tests tabulation, so candidate count and method only matter where noted.

Cfg Method Access public_results Edit vote State Used by
E1 STAR, 3 cand open ON off open a, f, g, h, i, k, o
E2 STAR, 3 cand open OFF off open b, p
E3 STAR, 3 cand closed list (admin-managed IDs) ON off open c
E4 STAR, 3 cand closed list (BV-managed IDs + email) ON ON open d
E5 STAR, 3 cand open ON off closed e, m
E6 RCV-IRV, 3 cand open ON off open j

Notes on setup: - E1 in draft state also serves BV240f — no separate election needed, just test before finalizing. - E4 is the only legal edit-vote configuration. ballot_updates requires voter_access != 'open' and invitation == 'email', so of the six canonical access modes only closed_bv_managed_ids permits it. Don't waste time trying edit-vote on an open election — it 400s and the switch silently reverts. - BV240k needs a multi-race variant of E1 (2 races, so 2 ballot pages). - Test users and templates: see the "User ID used for testing" and "Templates" tabs in the test-case sheet.

Tier 1 — the visibility gate (6 cases)

The notice's condition is public_results === true AND state ∈ {draft, open}. Three variables; the boundaries are where it breaks.

BV240a — notice appears on the ballot, before submit

Cfg: E1 · Automate: y 1. Open the voter link for E1. 2. Look at the ballot page before touching anything.

Expected: A notice appears above the races, stating that preliminary results are public and that it may be possible to infer how someone voted. It carries a link to the article. It is visible without submitting and without scrolling past the first race.

BV240b — no notice when the flag is off

Cfg: E2 · Automate: y 1. Open the voter link for E2. 2. Check the ballot page, the submit-confirm dialog, and the thank-you page.

Expected: No preliminary-results notice on any of the three. This is the most important negative — a disclaimer that shows up on elections with results hidden is worse than no disclaimer.

BV240c — closed-list extra layer ⚠️ wording not yet approved

Cfg: E3 · Automate: y 1. Open the voter link for E3 as an invited voter.

Expected: The base notice from BV240a plus a second layer stating that administrators can see which voters have voted and when, and that combined with live results the timing can narrow down how a particular voter voted.

Must NOT say administrators can look up a voter's ballot. ballot_id is scrubbed from every roll response unconditionally, and the voter→ballot join is only called from the edit-vote path — never from an admin endpoint. If the notice claims otherwise, fail the case as inaccurate, not as missing.

BV240d — closed list + edit vote (strongest variant) ⚠️ wording not yet approved

Cfg: E4 · Automate: y 1. Open the voter link for E4.

Expected: Base + closed-list layer, escalated to reflect that votes can be changed while voting is open. This combination is the real hazard: a stable ballot_id persists across edits and is column 1 of the public CSV export, so an observer watches one row's scores change rather than diffing aggregates.

BV240e — no preliminary notice once the election is closed

Cfg: E5 · Automate: y 1. Open E5 (voting closed, results public). 2. View the results page and, if reachable, the ballot page.

Expected: No preliminary-results warning. At this point the flag means "final results published" and carries none of the live-tally risk. One boolean is doing two different jobs — the copy must not treat them the same.

BV240f — notice appears in draft (admin ballot preview)

Cfg: E1 in draft · Automate: y 1. As admin, before finalizing, open the ballot preview.

Expected: The notice renders. Matters because public_results: true is the creation-wizard default (and the wizard never shows the creator that choice), and the anonymized-ballot endpoint is already live in draft.

Tier 2 — the article link (3 cases)

BV240g — link opens a new tab and the in-progress ballot survives ★ most likely to fail

Cfg: E1 · Automate: y 1. Open the ballot. Give candidate A a 5 and candidate B a 3. Do not submit. 2. Click the article link in the notice. 3. Return to the ballot tab.

Expected: The article opens in a new tab. The original ballot still shows A=5, B=3.

Why this fails: the markdown-link renderer defaults anchors to target='_self', and the notice component can't pass the flag that changes it. VotePage's races are React state with no draft persistence, so a same-tab navigation silently destroys everything the voter has entered. If this fails, the fix is an explicit <Link target='_blank' rel='noreferrer'> rather than a markdown link in an i18n value.

BV240h — the article URL resolves

Cfg: E1 · Automate: y 1. Click the link (or check the href).

Expected: 200, the preliminary-results help page. Not a 404, not the docs index.

BV240i — submit-confirm dialog carries the warning

Cfg: E1 · Automate: y 1. Fill the ballot, click Submit to open the confirmation dialog.

Expected: One sentence noting results are visible while voting is open, above the receipt-email field. Separate component from the banner, so a separate failure. The banner is scrollable-past; the dialog is the only surface the voter must actively confirm — which is what "transparent before they've cast their ballot" actually requires.

Tier 3 — rendering and layout (2 cases)

BV240j — ranked ballot gets the notice ★ most likely to fail

Cfg: E6 (RCV-IRV) · Automate: y 1. Open the RCV-IRV ballot with the drag-and-drop ranking interface.

Expected: The notice renders, same as on the STAR ballot.

Why this fails: the draggable ranked view bypasses the generic ballot renderer entirely and re-implements its own instructions block with no footer. If the notice was placed in the ballot view or footer instead of on the page wrapper, ranked elections silently get no disclaimer — the worst possible failure, because it's invisible unless you specifically test RCV.

BV240k — multi-race election renders it once

Cfg: E1 multi-race (2 races) · Automate: y 1. Open a 2-race ballot and page through both races.

Expected: One notice, on the page wrapper — not repeated per race, and not disappearing on race 2.

Tier 4 — admin-side copy (3 cases)

BV240l — rewritten tip text

Cfg: E1 admin · Automate: n (visual) 1. Go to the election settings, hover the ⓘ next to Show Preliminary Results.

Expected — the new text:

Public Results Controls whether voters can see election results. When enabled during an open election, voters will see preliminary results after submitting their ballot. High-profile elections typically keep results hidden until the election closes.

Plus a Learn More link to the article. The old text ("Allows voters to see the results of the election. If enabled while voting is open then voters will be shown to the preliminary results…") should be gone.

BV240m — the same tip under the other label ★ most likely to fail

Cfg: E5 admin (closed election) · Automate: n (visual) 1. On a closed election, open settings and hover the ⓘ. The switch label now reads Make Results Public, not "Show Preliminary Results".

Expected: The tip still reads sensibly. One tip serves both labels — there is a single public_results tip and the label swaps by election state — so text written only for "Show Preliminary Results" will read wrong here.

BV240n — tip renders as one paragraph, and poll terminology

Cfg: E1 admin + a Poll · Automate: n (visual) 1. Hover the ⓘ on an Election. Then create a Poll and hover the same ⓘ.

Expected: (a) The tip is one paragraph, not three separate lines — the old text is a YAML block whose newlines become <br/>s, and the new copy is a single paragraph, so the block style has to change. (b) On the Poll it says "poll", not "election".

Why (b) matters: the issue quotes the rendered string, which has "election" baked in. Pasting it literally would hard-code the word and regress poll terminology everywhere. The interpolation must be preserved.

Tier 5 — i18n and the known gap (2 cases)

BV240o — non-English voter

Cfg: E1, browser/UI language set to Spanish (then Polish, pt-BR) · Automate: n (visual) 1. Open the ballot in each locale.

Expected: The notice shows readable English prose as fallback — never a raw key like preliminary_results_notice.description. The new voter-facing strings land in the highest translation-priority band, so flag them for the translators.

BV240p — flag flipped mid-election (documents a gap, not a pass/fail)

Cfg: E2 → flip to ON · Automate: tbd (two-browser manual) 1. Browser A: open the ballot for E2 (results hidden). Confirm no notice. Leave it open, don't submit. 2. Browser B: as admin, turn Show Preliminary Results on. 3. Browser A: submit the ballot.

Expected / actual: the voter sees no notice and submits without ever being disclosed to. There is no state guard on the setting, so this is by design today.

Not a bug in #1350 — copy cannot fix it. Record the outcome and reference open question Q5 on the ticket: either the audit log from #1353 / PR #1365 covers it, or the notice wording has to say the setting can change mid-election. Worth a screenshot pair for the ticket.

Regression

Two existing Playwright specs create elections with public_results: true, so both will start rendering the new notice and the new dialog sentence once this lands:

  • testing/tests/election-with-rolls.spec.ts
  • testing/tests/election-without-rolls.spec.ts

Expect selector churn. Not new test cases — existing specs to update in the same PR.

Rows for the test-case sheet

Tab-separated, in the sheet's column order. Method is any except where the renderer is the point; Testing Area follows the existing vocabulary (ballots / casting / reports).

Test ID Scenario Name   BetterVoting Link   md file YAML File   Method  Testing Area / Type Ties ? Y/N  Status  Failure Reason  GitHub Issue    No of races No of Winners   No of Cand  No of Ballots   YouTube video   Questions   Test Date   md file comments / keywords     Automation Next Steps
BV240a  BV240a - Preliminary results notice appears on ballot before submit tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd na          disclaimer, privacy     y
BV240b  BV240b - No notice when public results is off   tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd na          disclaimer, negative test       y
BV240c  BV240c - Closed-list extra warning layer    tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   wording not approved (Q2)   https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd What may the warning claim?         disclaimer, closed list     y
BV240d  BV240d - Closed list + edit vote - strongest warning    tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   wording not approved (Q2)   https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd na          disclaimer, closed list, edit vote      y
BV240e  BV240e - No preliminary notice once election is closed  tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd Confirm intent - one flag, two jobs         disclaimer, state boundary      y
BV240f  BV240f - Notice appears in draft ballot preview tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   0   tbd na          disclaimer, draft       y
BV240g  BV240g - Article link opens new tab, in-progress ballot survives    tbd         any casting n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   1   tbd na          disclaimer, link, data loss risk        y
BV240h  BV240h - Article URL resolves   tbd         any help    n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  na  na  na  na  tbd na          disclaimer, link        y
BV240i  BV240i - Submit-confirm dialog carries the warning  tbd         any casting n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   1   tbd Banner only or banner + dialog? (Q1)            disclaimer, casting     y
BV240j  BV240j - Ranked (draggable IRV) ballot gets the notice  tbd         RCV IRV ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd na          disclaimer, RCV, renderer bypass        y
BV240k  BV240k - Multi-race ballot renders notice once  tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  2   1   3   3   tbd na          disclaimer, multi-race      y
BV240l  BV240l - Rewritten Public Results tip text  tbd         any reports n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   0   tbd na          copy, admin tip     n
BV240m  BV240m - Same tip under Make Results Public label   tbd         any reports n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd na          copy, admin tip, label swap     n
BV240n  BV240n - Tip is one paragraph; poll vs election wording tbd         any reports n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   0   tbd na          copy, i18n interpolation        n
BV240o  BV240o - Non-English voter sees English fallback not raw key    tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   feature not implemented https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   3   tbd na          i18n, es pl pt-BR       n
BV240p  BV240p - Flag flipped mid-election - voter never disclosed to   tbd         any ballots n   Not ready   by design today - see Q5    https://github.com/Equal-Vote/bettervoting/issues/1350  1   1   3   1   tbd Audit log or reworded notice? (Q5)          disclaimer, gap, mid-election change        tbd

Which 5 actually catch bugs

BV240g (same-tab link destroying the ballot), BV240j (ranked renderer bypass), BV240m (one tip, two labels), BV240n (block style → three lines), BV240e (closed-state boundary). The other eleven are confirmation.

Open questions carried from the ticket

  • Q1 → BV240i: banner only, or banner + submit dialog?
  • Q2 → BV240c/d: who approves the closed-list wording? Blocks both cases.
  • Q3 → BV240f: should the notice show in draft?
  • Q4 → BV240e: should it show once closed?
  • Q5 → BV240p: mid-election flip — audit log, or reworded notice?
  • Q6 → not covered by a case: should the invite email carry a line too? For closed lists it's chronologically the first voter surface, but backend templates have no i18n (English-only) and the flag can flip after invites go out.