[Pkg-mozext-maintainers] [proposal] XUL Extensions policy additions

[Mike Hommey]

On Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 06:55:08PM +0100, Guido Günther wrote:
> On Sat, Nov 14, 2009 at 01:44:07AM +0100, Mike Hommey wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > I'd like to propose the following addition to the XUL extension policy:
> > 
> > - Preference files that are normally found in defaults/preferences in
> >   the xpi should be installed in /etc/mozilla-extensions and should
> >   preferably named extension-name.js.
> > 
> > A few notes about the above:
> > - I'm proposing /etc/mozilla-extensions because there is already such a
> >   directory, and moving the configuration files would be painful for
> >   those packages that do implement this.
> > - The file name clause may be better as a "must" than a "should
> >   preferably"
> > - Obviously a symbolic link from
> >   /usr/share/mozilla/extensions/foobar/default/preferences must be
> >   added.
> > 
> > On an unrelated note, I'd like to suggest to move the policy in its own
> > wiki page, so that it can be referred more easily. Something like
> > Mozilla/ExtensionsPolicy could be a good place IMHO, so that I can add
> > Mozilla/PluginsPolicy and maybe others later.
> Sure. Please go ahead!

Done. I also put a link from Teams/DebianMozExtTeam, though on the long
term, it should be in another category than TODO.

I'll finalize the wording for the preferences files location and will
update the policy draft in the next few days. There is also something
else I would like to discuss for inclusion.

I've been thinking (and my lintian check prototype helped in realizing
some things I hadn't thought through), and I'd have some more
propositions.

First, I'd like to relax the location of the extensions files
themselves. Let's say they can be anywhere, as far as there are proper
symbolic links in the appropriate places under
/usr/{lib,share}/mozilla/extensions.

Second, I'd like to reaffirm that the extensions files should also be
available in /usr/{lib,share}/mozilla/extensions/common/em:id, except
for extensions that support only one application (think langpacks,
mostly), which should use /usr/{lib,share}/mozilla/extensions/app-id/em:id.

Third, that it's discouraged, though not formally forbidden, to put
files outside /usr/{lib,share}/mozilla/extensions, especially
considering that:
- If an extension is for one application only, there only needs to be
  one location under /usr/{lib,share}/mozilla/extensions. It's pointless
  to make it a symlink to somewhere else.
- On the long term, extensions that are shared between applications are
  going in a single location, to, in which case it's also pointless to
  make that single location a symlink to somewhere else. Which is why we
  encourage such extensions to use the
  /usr/{lib,share}/mozilla/extensions/common/em:id directory as their
  canonical location.

Finally, I wonder if we don't actually need to allow some extensions
(I'm actually thinking about langpacks) to install directly under
/usr/lib/appname/extensions. The fact is, we may have 3 different kinds
of extensions instead of 2:
- Extensions that work in several applications
- Extensions that work in one application whatever its branding is
- Extensions that work in one application and depends on its branding
IIRC, langpacks *do* include branding. To take an example, iceweasel and
firefox share the same application id, which is something you'd want, by
design. But the problem is that if we'd install iceweasel langpacks in
the /usr/share/mozilla/extensions/iceweasel-appid, firefox would also be
getting these extensions, that could very well rename some items from
Firefox to Iceweasel, which is kind of unexpected.
But maybe I'm just being overzealous, here, and we needn't care.

What do you think ?

Cheers,

Mike