1304021 - Provide a way for extensions to add content to a pane of about:preferences

Status: NEW

(WebExtensions :: Frontend, enhancement, P5)

Description

[Matthew N. [:MattN]]

For the Form Autofill System Add-on we would like to add a new section to about:preferences#privacy. If we want to eventually have System Add-ons be web extensions it seems like we'd need solution for this.

Currently content scripts don't work on about: URIs.

Comment 1

[Andy McKay]

Just a note that I don't think we should take it as a given that all system add-ons should be WebExtensions.

Comment 2

[Robert Helmer [:rhelmer]]

(In reply to Andy McKay [:andym] from comment #1)
> Just a note that I don't think we should take it as a given that all system
> add-ons should be WebExtensions.


I'll start a discussion outside of this bug.

All currently-shipping system add-ons are either bootstrap.js or Add-on SDK, but there's a lot of movement now towards using the hybrid/transition type - using WebExtension APIs where possible and filling in the gaps with the internal Firefox APIs exposed to the current extension system.

I think this will serve us fine for the near term but it's going to hamper our ability to remove legacy technologies from Firefox longer-term, so I think it's time to start figuring out what that is going to look like.

Comment 3

[Kris Maglione [:kmag]]

I think that using WebExtension APIs as much as possible is fine, but there are going to be times when it makes more sense to use hybrid add-ons than to try to shoehorn everything we want to do into WebExtension APIs.

I think that adding content to about:preferences is probably going to be a common enough thing for system add-ons, though, that it's worth supporting as a privileged API.

Comment 4

[Andy McKay]

Sorry for distracting from the discussion. Sticking to the main point, I can see this being a useful API, but should be restricted as per bug 1280235.

Comment 5

[Shane Caraveo (:mixedpuppy)]

no pull on this for 2 years, downgrading.