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January 22, 2005

Plugin Finder Feedback?

I'll hopefully have some time soon (once XForms gets to its first milestone at the end of the month) to fix the outstanding plugin finder service (pfs) bugs for Firefox 1.1.

So I am looking for feedback on the existing feature in Firefox 1.0 (its being ported to Seamonkey as we speak - I love opensource contributors).

Things on my list:
- clean up the code. The code was designed to be used with a web service, but ended up being replaced with remote RDF. Thus the code can stand some cleanup.
- local cache of plugins to reduce load of the mofo server. The idea is in the future, a company could ship their version of the cache, which will allow individual mimetypes to be bound to a pfs server. That way, IBM can make sure internal Firefoxes will always get the IBM Java rather than Sun's.
- start enterprise features. The first one will be the ability to supply multiple pfs servers, so that for example Company A could use its intranet server, but allow falling back to the mofo one.

Posted by doron at January 22, 2005 2:02 PM

Comments

I think we really need is a pfs proxy.

Something a company can install behind it's firewall. It can proxy the data in a secure method. And add the companies own extensions.

No I'm not volunteering to write one ;-). I've more than got my hands full at the moment.

Posted by: Robert Accettura at January 22, 2005 2:58 PM

One thing that I have noticed with the plugin finder service that would help the UI is the EULAs that each plugin has. Currently, Firefox displays their website's EULA in a small window. It is not large enough to read the text on Real or Macromedia's websites without tons of scrolling. If the EULA could be displayed as just text or reformatted to fit the window that would be a very impressive change. Not one that would change the functionality, just the polish.

Posted by: tim at January 22, 2005 3:38 PM

What I have found that is causing trouble is that PFS doesn't distinguish between architectures. For example I have Firefox installed on Gentoo Linux and it is all compiled in 64-bits for AMD64. But PFS still offers and downloads 32-bit Flash plugin, which offcourse doesn't work with 64-bit Mozilla. More errors like this will surface when users start using 64-bit Windows XP for AMD64.

Posted by: Jure Repinc at January 22, 2005 4:36 PM

Robert, I'm pretty sure that's out of our control. Macromedia dictates the format and that's why it is the way it is.

--Asa

Posted by: Asa Dotzler at January 22, 2005 5:07 PM

>I think we really need is a pfs proxy.
>
>Something a company can install behind it's >firewall. It can proxy the data in a secure method. >And add the companies own extensions.
>
>No I'm not volunteering to write one ;-). I've more >than got my hands full at the moment.

I've written one for IBM already, hence the need for the option of multiple pfs servers, as what happens if the user is outside the IBM intranet?

The proxy is rather simple, and I hope to add it to CVS once it all goes in.

As for 64 bit, that is on my list as well. I know that extensions have a similar problem (compiled xpcom components), so I will hopefully sync with Ben on that.

Posted by: doron [TypeKey Profile Page] at January 22, 2005 8:19 PM

something that always troubled me but haven't filed in a bug yet:
when I go to a site which needs a plugin, a little window pops up under the address bar and says:
"Additional plugins are required to display all the media on this page [install missing plugins...]"
the only way to know which plugins are needed is to lunch the pfs,

I think it would be much easier for the user (i.e. me) to know ahead which plugins are missing - whether by naming them in the plugin area (where it says: "click here to download plugin") or better yet - on that small popup window.

something like:
"Flash is required to display all the media on this page [install Flash]"

and

"Flash and Java are required to display all the media on this page [install plugins]"

Posted by: Ido at January 24, 2005 10:37 AM

Agree with Ido. This could be considered a security risk as it is at the moment. I would like to know what plugin Firefox is about to head off and attempt to download for me.

J

Posted by: JP at February 4, 2005 12:48 PM