Deploy customized Firefox to new users

Sat Jan 10 01:41:43 UTC 2015

Thanks, Andre.

That question is primarily of interest in connection with the /etc/skel 
approach.

Skel began to look more attractive as I ran into some problems trying to 
implement with Firefox methods and the articles I cited below.

But it turns out that, though only a couple years old, some of the 
article information is obsolete.

I have now found http://kb.mozillazine.org/Installing_extensions (why 
didn't I find that sooner?), which solves the one problem I was having, 
and may turn out to be the go-to method for globally installing 
extensions in Firefox.

On 1/9/2015 8:33 PM, Andre Rodovalho wrote:
> > Do cookies use the profile name?
>
> No, definitely... some browsers do not have "profile names"...
> The info a website can get from the user is very very limited...
>
>
>
> 2015-01-09 13:19 GMT-02:00 John Hupp <lubuntu at prpcompany.com 
> <mailto:lubuntu at prpcompany.com>>:
>
>     On 1/9/2015 7:02 AM, Eric Bradshaw wrote:
>>     Hello, all.
>>     In Firefox for the initial user on a system, I want to customize it
>>     (settings, add-ons, etc) and then propagate that setup to any new
>>     users
>>     created.
>>     I was reading
>>     https://wiki.mozilla.org/Deployment:Deploying_Firefox, but
>>     several of the add-ons and links of interest (e.g.
>>     firefox.dbltree.com <http://firefox.dbltree.com>
>>     <http://firefox.dbltree.com> and CCK add-on
>>     <https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/cck/>) no longer exist.
>>     Anyone know a way?
>>     --John
>>     P.S. Next on my to-do list is a close look at SystemBack, which will
>>     perhaps handle this chore, but for the moment I was looking at
>>     application-native methods of doing such things.  For instance, for
>>     certain purposes I can modify the files installed by
>>     lubuntu-default-settings.  I have also had a little look at
>>     /etc/skel
>>     and /etc/profile.d, though those two seem to have limited use in
>>     Lubuntu.
>>
>>     ----------
>>
>>     John,
>>
>>     User addons for Firefox are (for the most part I believe) .xpi
>>     files and are stored in
>>     home/theusername/.mozilla/firefox/crazymixof#s&letters.default-stringof#s/extensions.
>>
>>     You propagate the settings, addons, bookmarks, etc. to newly
>>     created users by including the whole .mozilla folder in
>>     /etc/skel. Including things in skel is the default way (in any
>>     *buntu) to ensure new users have the same "settings," or
>>     "profile" as the user account the system/distro/respin is being
>>     created on.
>>
>>     However, Systemback automatically picks up the settings/profile
>>     of the user account used to create the backup ("Live system
>>     create" in my case) when the box to "Include user data files" is
>>     checked. As far as I can tell; everything I'd usually have to
>>     specifically include in skel is automatically carried over.
>>
>>     So, that means I no longer have to make sure I include the latest
>>     ".whatever" folders in skel to pass on the settings for several
>>     different applications (including Firefox) to the newly created
>>     users. I simply set up the user account - I'm using Systemback on
>>     - the way I want it to be, before I create the live system.
>>
>>     By the way; I set aside a separate machine (though a different
>>     user account would probably work just as well) for system
>>     creation as I'd imagine either method on a computer/account I use
>>     for myself would be too easily "contaminated" with my own stuff.
>>
>>     Eric
>>
>>     ----
>>
>>     Thank you,
>>     God bless you,
>>     Computers4Christians
>>     http://computers4christians.org/
>>
>
>     Thanks Eric, for the additional info on the behavior of
>     Systemback.  I'll be looking at that soon.  Also the confirmation
>     that /etc/skel is fully respected as the general-purpose tool for
>     propagating files to new users.  It seems like it would probably
>     work for my purposes.
>
>     But to raise a few prospective issues: I'm talking about
>     propagating a Firefox setup /on a single machine/ to additional
>     new users.  The skel method would create identically-named
>     profiles for each of those users, which is not what Firefox does
>     in an ordinary new installation.  But that would not be a problem
>     because they would be in different sessions and not know about
>     each other, unless perhaps the user made use of the Firefox Sync
>     feature?  Do cookies use the profile name?
>
>     And in the meantime, I found veteran Firefox developer Mike Kaply
>     and the many informative articles that he has generously written. 
>     For instance:
>     Integrating Add-ons into Firefox
>     <http://mike.kaply.com/2012/02/09/integrating-add-ons-into-firefox/>
>     Distribution.ini
>     <http://mike.kaply.com/2012/03/26/customizing-firefox-distribution-ini/>
>     Default Preferences Files
>     <http://mike.kaply.com/2012/03/15/customizing-firefox-default-preference-files/>
>     Autoconfig Files
>     <http://mike.kaply.com/2012/03/16/customizing-firefox-autoconfig-files/>
>     Default Profiles
>     <http://mike.kaply.com/2012/03/30/customizing-firefox-default-profiles/>
>
>     Those articles provide at least two native Firefox methods for
>     each of my goals (propagating settings and also add-ons).
>
>     Kaply also recently released CCK2, which replaces the CCK I found
>     was no longer available (from my original post).  I understand
>     CCK2 to be an add-on that provides a front-end for the methods
>     described in his articles like the ones above.
>
>     --
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>
>

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