885673 - Document package.json's 'unpack' field

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Add-on SDK Graveyard :: Documentation, defect)

Description

[Wes Kocher (:KWierso) (Not reading bugmail; email directly if needed)]

If you set 'unpack': 'true' in your package.json, that gets converted to <unpack>true</unpack> in your generated xpi's install.rdf file, telling Firefox to unpack your extension when you install it. 

It's currently not listed in the documentation. 

It probably should be.

Comment 1

[Wes Kocher (:KWierso) (Not reading bugmail; email directly if needed)]

Thinking back, I think we didn't want this documented, as it causes performance issues.

Comment 2

[noitidart]

I think you might as well document it guys, it causes a lot of confusion to those that need it. We had a guy running around on StackOverflow for 24 hours. Maybe put a big warning saying don't do this unless you really have to. It would be nice to know what the perf issues were.

Comment 3

[Tomislav Jovanovic :zombie]

reopening for reconsideration..

Comment 4

[noitidart]

Thanks, but btw that unpack solution for that guy on StackOverflow turned out to be the wrong idea. It was better to put the file in the data folder than get it with self.data.url('blah.py') and then copy it with NetUtils.jsm and place it in temporary folder. But I don't know if your average sdk guy knows that much, an unpack could have helped him with the goal of sdk which is speed dev. Then an amo editor could say hey dont do that, use netutils. I dont know, but i see why unpacking was kept secret from docs. Thanks for reopen though.

Comment 5

[Jeff Griffiths (:canuckistani) (:⚡︎)]

(In reply to noitidart from comment #4)
> Thanks, but btw that unpack solution for that guy on StackOverflow turned
> out to be the wrong idea. It was better to put the file in the data folder
> than get it with self.data.url('blah.py') and then copy it with NetUtils.jsm
> and place it in temporary folder. But I don't know if your average sdk guy
> knows that much, an unpack could have helped him with the goal of sdk which
> is speed dev. Then an amo editor could say hey dont do that, use netutils. I
> dont know, but i see why unpacking was kept secret from docs. Thanks for
> reopen though.

It would be awesome to have a module on npm that helped that process for people.

Comment 6

[Wes Kocher (:KWierso) (Not reading bugmail; email directly if needed)]

Reclosing this. Lets get that module pushed to npm.