Closed Bug 910550 Opened 11 years ago Closed 6 years ago

Add better UI for when there are multiple copies of an addon in different locations

Categories

(Toolkit :: Add-ons Manager, defect)

defect
Not set
normal

Tracking

()

RESOLVED INACTIVE

People

(Reporter: Unfocused, Unassigned)

Details

When you have two copies of an add-on installed in different locations, the addon in the higher priority location will be visible. The UI (and API) currently allow you to uninstall that copy (assuming it's not in a locked location), which reveals the other copy (in the lower priority location).

So, basically, the uninstall button is a lie.

Ideally, the uninstall button should uninstall that add-on, and keep the other copy invisible - so the add-on disappears from the UI, like a normal uninstall.

However, we still need a way to get to the other copy. So we should have some UI that lets you select which version of the add-on to use.
I have discovered this bug from  "Comment 77 Blair McBride ... 2015-01-04 18:21:42 PST " of
Bug 640775 - Allow a form of uninstalling add-ons installed globally by third-party applications or system administrators.
"(In reply to Sachin Hosmani [:sachin] from comment #73)
> About reinstalling global add-ons, I feel we should disallow reinstallation
> (both API-wise and UI-wise when it's done) when there is another copy
> present in a higher priority location (like user profile).
> 
> As far as I understand, there can be no situation now, when an add-on in a
> higher priority location still exists and is disabled/invisible but a copy
> of it in a lower priority location is active. We don't want the higher
> priority add-on automatically getting visible during next startup.

Yep, that's correct... for now. Eventually I'd like to change that with bug 910550 - but I don't think you need to worry about that here."

In my "Comment 74 Jean-Marie COUPRIE 2015-01-02 11:54:37 PST" I have said :
"Start situation : a globally installed add-on. 
0) Now I install an other version (older or newer) in one of my user profiles that I use for tests. It hides the global one." Of course this should occurs only for the test profile and not for the other profiles. 
"1) I test it and I am not satisfied, so I disable" or UN-install" it in my test user profile. " In this case the global add-on should reappear and be active in the test profile.
So I support the initial wording of the bug 910550.

In my other "Comment 76 Jean-Marie COUPRIE 2015-01-04 08:35:29 PST " I have said :
"... AFAIK, I can't globally install an extension via Firefox UI even if I have admin access to the machine : this is a limitation when the extension is needed for all the profiles of all the accounts of the machine ..."
 Can the initial wording of the bug 910550 be extended to allow the global installation and UN-installation from the admin account and only disable in any particular profile ? Or does it need a new bug ?
(In reply to Jean-Marie COUPRIE from comment #1)
>  Can the initial wording of the bug 910550 be extended to allow the global
> installation and UN-installation from the admin account and only disable in
> any particular profile ? Or does it need a new bug ?

Separate bug. However:
* We have bug 879480 for providing a way for other applications to request a global install/uninstall.
* I don't see a place for providing UI to globally install an add-on. That's what external tools are for (it could potentially be done via an add-on).
* I'm not going to accept any patch that uninstalls globally installed add-ons by deleting files or modifying the Windows registry. There are too many issues with that approach, ranging from unintentionally breaking other applications, to having the add-on automatically re-added. We have an alternate solution in bug 640775 that solves the problem a different way.
 bug 879480 seems very promising to ease global installation. Thanks for the reference.
Can it be used also by Firefox considered as the "external processes" ?

"* I don't see a place for providing UI to globally install an add-on." The logical place seems to modify the standard dialogue that proposes to install : give 2 choices (locally in the profile, globally) in it, keeping a record of the choice to avoid problems at UN-install time, may be reserved to administrator account. Is this difficult to code after finishing bug 879480 ?

This may be out of subject here but I ask advices from the "mentor" before entering a "Separate bug" without hope of success...
Per policy at https://wiki.mozilla.org/Bug_Triage/Projects/Bug_Handling/Bug_Husbandry#Inactive_Bugs. If this bug is not an enhancement request or a bug not present in a supported release of Firefox, then it may be reopened.
Status: NEW → RESOLVED
Closed: 6 years ago
Resolution: --- → INACTIVE
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