Looking Glass extension

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tanstaafl
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by tanstaafl »

According to https://gizmodo.com/mozilla-slipped-a-m ... 1821332254 the add-on will be moved to the add-ons store.

https://drewdevault.com/2017/12/16/Fire ... slope.html

"For a long time, it was just setting the default search provider to Google in exchange for a beefy stipend. Later, paid links in your new tab page were added. Then, a proprietary service, Pocket, was bundled into the browser - not as an addon, but a hardcoded feature. In the past few days, we’ve discovered an advertisement in the form of browser extension was sideloaded into user browsers. Whoever is leading these decisions at Mozilla needs to be stopped."

Mozilla is doing well financially. Any clue as to why the culture has changed?
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Gingerbread Man
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Gingerbread Man »

There are a couple of other bug reports you may be interested in. As usual, please don't add critical comments there; those belong on input.mozilla.org.
  • Bug 1425187 - Don't allow shield studies/experiments without any explanation in description what they do and without related Mozilla bug URL with more detailed information
  • Bug 1425171 - about:addons should indicate when an extension is a study
tanstaafl wrote:Then, a proprietary service, Pocket, was bundled into the browser - not as an addon, but a hardcoded feature.
Pocket isn't a "hardcoded feature"; it's a bundled add-on. It does nothing until used and it can be disabled by setting extensions.pocket.enabled to false in about:config. It's also possible to delete it from <installation folder>\browser\features though that might be a bad idea.
Gusar
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Gusar »

Gingerbread Man wrote:Pocket isn't a "hardcoded feature"; it's a bundled add-on.
It started as a hardcoded feature, it got moved to an add-on later.
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James
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by James »

I removed the above Bugzilla links initially due to pointless comments Spam recently then realized the three related bugs were closed to those who are not part of editbugs group.

https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/page.cgi?id=etiquette.html
No pointless comments. Limit comments on a bug to information which will help with resolving it. Unless requested, additional "I see this too" or "It works for me" comments are unnecessary.
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Frank Lion
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Frank Lion »

Gusar wrote:
Gingerbread Man wrote:Pocket isn't a "hardcoded feature"; it's a bundled add-on.
It started as a hardcoded feature, it got moved to an add-on later.
Indeed, it started life as a 3rd Party extension (add-on), was then hardcoded into Firefox and is now a technical add-on, just like formautofill@mozilla.org.xpi, screenshots@mozilla.org.xpi, etc.

It's important to draw the distinction between add-ons and technical add-ons, as the former give users both information and choice about what is going on, whereas technical add-ons are just an inclusion method for the convenience of the software maker and nothing more.

Back story - technical add-ons are how your present day extensions and themes came into existence. Back in the very early days of Firefox, it lacked some basic features and this was the method chosen so that volunteers could quickly and simply add features to the core program. Later, the really essential ones were hardcoded in and the 50/50 needed were shown publicly and as options to the user. The users liked that idea and the rest followed very quickly.

So yeah, your Firefox extensions and themes all sort of came about by accident.

***

Hard to believe now, but yeah, there was a time when Firefox was developed by some very, very smart and innovative people.

These days, it's more like a bunch of school children discovering an ancient pyramid in a field and deciding which blocks to remove, what colour to paint it or if good money could be made by selling glasses of homemade lemonade by setting up a stall in its entrance way.
"The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil, is for good men to do nothing." - Edmund Burke (attrib.)
.
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tanstaafl
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by tanstaafl »

In general, how do you delete a "technical add-on"? If it helps, pretend I don't trust "Follow-on Search Telemetry" and want to get rid of it since I'm not convinced that any of the toolkit.telemetry.* or extensions.* settings let me disable it.

Is this a bad/dangerous thing to do (ignoring the question of can you disable it via settings instead)?

Do you need to use a tool such as IObit uninstaller or Revo Uninstaller to remove it or is it practical to do it manually?

Can you prevent it from being automatically re-installed next update?
flaneurb
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by flaneurb »

At one time they were referred to as system extensions: https://superuser.com/questions/1117062 ... t-removing
It is true that we're now releasing some features internally as something we call "System Extension", which technically is the same as an addon you could install on addons.mozilla.org, with the difference that these come pre-installed with Firefox and there is no way to disable them. We mainly do this to be able to ship updates faster, but it's also nice that we have some features totally separated, which makes the development process easier for us!
TDV
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by TDV »

Frank Lion wrote:
Firefox worked with the Mr. Robot team to create a custom experience that would surprise and delight fans of the show and our users...
If like me, and the 6.7 billion other people of the world, you had do idea wtf 'Mr Robot' was supposed to be, it turns out to be an American TV series with fast dropping ratings - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._Robot#Ratings

What's next? Teal'c from the hit series Stargate SG1 running across my New Tab page, shouting 'Jaffa Kree!' out of the screen and vanishing into the night?

would surprise and delight fans of the show...
All 0.53 million of them.

The first series was excellent, if you get a chnace: watch.

But that was the whole story they had, as there were now many people who could be sold any crap under name MrRobot, the "creators" came up with series 2 & 3, where the hero turns out not only to be simply a schizo, but also a philistine. So, of course more and more stopped watching it... :sleeping:
TDV
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by TDV »

I upgraded to 57.0.2 two days ago. (Win7 ulti 32bit)
In about:config > telemetry i find about 25 entries, some of them are valkued "true".

As I am allergic to any kind of telemetry, I would like to get rid off anything by that name or with that function. That goes also about "toolkit telemetry" another 15 entries with several of them "true"

How do I proceed?

Also: I cannot find any mention of looking glass. Does that mean there is nothing, or just that is better hidden?

Thanks
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Mark12547
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Mark12547 »

TDV wrote:Also: I cannot find any mention of looking glass. Does that mean there is nothing, or just that is better hidden?
Apparently the Mozilla executives have finally heard the complaints and had Looking Glass withdrawn, and it will be a regular extension one would be able to install from addons.mozilla.org in a day or so.
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Gingerbread Man
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Gingerbread Man »

tanstaafl wrote:In general, how do you delete a "technical add-on"?
While Firefox is closed, move it out of <installation folder>\browser\features. I don't want any of them, so I made a batch file that renames the features folder, or restores its name if it's already been renamed. I have a scheduled task for it that I launch via shortcut, so that I don't have to deal with the UAC prompt.
tanstaafl wrote:Is this a bad/dangerous thing to do (ignoring the question of can you disable it via settings instead)?
Developers stress that disabling system add-ons is "unsupported" though I've never heard details of what unintended consequences this would have. Back when people were editing omni.ja, doing so would break partial updates, causing the full installer to be downloaded; that's probably the case here as well.
tanstaafl wrote:Can you prevent it from being automatically re-installed next update?
Not really. You could probably try to mess with the permissions for the features folder, but who knows how the installer would react if it can't create files where it expects to.
Brummelchen
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Brummelchen »

though I've never heard details of what unintended consequences this would have.
i can tell you - about:blank and about:newtab no longer functional.
i only habe aushelper working, even the rest of exe files (plugin, maintainance, ping) is gone.

this wild card testing from mozilla is not new, it started with shield and ofc they are collecting !anonymous! telemetrie about firefox behavior on sites or addons - or failure.
removing is only for experienced user, and it always is reinstalled with updates (to remember).

i dont like mozillas ra trace but i also dont complain when my bugs where not fixed.
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Gingerbread Man
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Gingerbread Man »

Brummelchen wrote:i can tell you - about:blank and about:newtab no longer functional.
I have no problem opening about:blank. For me, broken about:newtab is a wholly intended consequence of removing Activity Stream.
Brummelchen
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by Brummelchen »

exactly. not by purpose at first, but now. /me uses another start page and if no content it wont bother me because i have a third (unknown extension) and ofc a fourth (bookmark) option for my favorite pages.
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mightyglydd
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Re: Looking Glass extension

Post by mightyglydd »

Brummelchen wrote:this wild card testing
Here on Earth we call it what it is, ADVERTISING A TV SHOW, 'coincidentally' it's on the same network that was running Mozilla ads...now you do the math.
#KeepFightingMichael and Alex.
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