1412295 - A sideloaded extension which overrides the default search page will never display the secondary prompt

Status: REOPENED

(WebExtensions :: General, enhancement, P5)

Description

[Bob Silverberg [:bsilverberg]]

This is an issue I noticed when looking for the cause of bug 1412291. Currently, if an extension overrides the default search, and it does so using a new engine (as opposed to one of the built-in engines), it displays an extra prompt to the user asking them to confirm they want to change the default search engine.

This only happens on initial install - it doesn't happen when an extension is enabled, and that makes sense in most cases, as we don't want to prompt the user again for something they've already allowed. The problem is that when sideloading an extension it gets installed in the background and the only action a user takes is to enable it after that. When a user enables the extension for the first time they are not shown this extra prompt.

Comment 1

[Bob Silverberg [:bsilverberg]]

I'm not sure if this is a bug or not, but it seems like one to me. What do you think, Mike?

Comment 2

[Mike Kaply [:mkaply]]

This effectively prevents sideloading add-ons from changing the search engine which is actually the behavior we want.

Comment 3

[Andrew Swan [:aswan]]

If that's the behavior that we want, then we need to add a test for it

Comment 4

[Mike Kaply [:mkaply]]

Do we have sideload tests today?

Comment 5

[Andrew Swan [:aswan]]

(In reply to Mike Kaply [:mkaply] from comment #4)
> Do we have sideload tests today?

Yes, many.  You could do this with an xpcshell test that uses AddonTestUtils.manuallyInstall() and then AddonTestUtils.promiseStartupManager().  That would have to watch for the observables that we use to trigger notifications.  Alternatively, you could write a mochitest that drops xpis into the profile and then runs (from chrome code) AddonManagerPrivate.getNewSideloads().

Comment 6

[Mike Kaply [:mkaply]]

We don't support sideloading anymore.

Comment 7

[Shane Caraveo (:mixedpuppy)]

(In reply to Mike Kaply [:mkaply] from comment #6)

We don't support sideloading anymore.

We do.