Have you ever needed to customize Firefox for deployment with in your organization or even to your family? That’s what the CCK Wizard is all about. It allows you to create an add-on that customizes Firefox. You can learn more about what it does at addons.mozilla.org.

I’ve recently updated the CCK Wizard for Firefox 4 and have made a beta available. You can click here to install it. Once everything looks good with the beta, I’ll put it on AMO.

So what’s the future of the CCK Wizard?

The CCK Wizard has always been close to my heart because it was my first add-on. I originally had plans to do some major enhancements to it, but my plate is pretty full with other work. It’s difficult to find time to work on my free add-ons. I’ll continue to keep it current with the latest Firefox versions, but going forward, I have no plans to add additional features to the CCK Wizard.

If you’d like to see the CCK Wizard continue, please consider contributing or participating in its development at Google code. You could also help out on the documentation side. It would be nice to get some of the docs current and organized:

• Old Docs
• Original CCK Docs
• Better place for docs

I also want to give a shout out to Rick Alther from IBM who has worked on the code and is keeping the flame alive inside IBM

I’d really like to try to engage the community in figure out what to do next. What should the UI look like? Is there missing functionality?

So please do me a favor, install the CCK Wizard and post your opinion. I’d love to take the CCK Wizard in a new direction, but I need some helping deciding which way to go.

What I’m going to do with this post is explain exactly how BYOB works internally so that you can create your own distribution that has all the customizations you want. There are a some downsides to our method – primarily that we are Windows only and that we can’t sign our installers with the Mozilla certificate. But it’s the only way we can create a distribution that includes our own add-ons.

BYOB works by taking advantage of the features of the distribution directory in Firefox. The main component of the distribution directory is the distribution.ini file. The distribution.ini does have some documentation, but there are a few more tricks that we need to know about.

Previously I had talked about customizing the Firefox installer, and all that information is going to come into play here. What we’re going to do is after we’ve unpacked the Firefox installer we want to use, we’re going to create a subdirectory called distribution in the nonlocalized directory. In that directory, we’re going to create a file called distribution.ini. We can use this web page as a template for that file. The distribution.ini file is going to contain any preferences and bookmarks that we want to specify as part of our distribution. Information on how to create those things is in the sample file.

Next up are search engines. Search engines are placed in a subdirectory called searchplugins under the distribution directory. For search engines that we want installed for everyone, we put them in another subdirectory called common (searchplugins/common). If there are search plugins we want to be locale specific, we can put them in a directory that is named the same as the locale (This is all documented in the sample distribution.ini).

When I talked about customizing the Firefox installer, I indicated that you could preinstall add-ons by unzipping them into the nonlocalized/extensions directory. With the distribution directory, we have a new option. If we create a bundles directory and then put our add-ons in there, they are completely hidden from the user. They can’t be uninstalled or disabled. The method for putting add-ons in this directory is the same as before – create a directory that named the same as the ID of the add-on and then unzip the add-on into that directory.

If you’ve used BYOB, though, you may have noticed that they do things a little differently. If you bundle add-ons with your browser, they are installed the first time you start the browser. And if you create another profile, it gets those add-ons as well. And they are installed into your profile directory. This is accomplished is via a custom add-on that was created by Appcoast called the Addon Installer. I could find no information at all on this add-on. I’m going to document here how it works, but if you choose to use it, it’s at your own risk. To obtain it, you can download any of the browsers at the bottom of the BYOB page. After unpacking one of those installers, you’ll see the Addon Installer in nonlocalized/distribution/bundles/{04C927C9-E491-4DDC-9D45-54C145422A15}. Just duplicate that directory in your distribution. If I get a chance, I might create a version of this that is open source.

To use the Addon Installer, place the XPI files you want to install into a directory called extensions under the distribution directory. Then create a file called config.ini in that directory. The format of the config.ini file is like this:

[Extension0]
id=THE ID OF THE FIRST EXTENSION
file=THE XPI OF THE FIRST EXTENSION.XPI
Version=0.0.0
OS=ALL
[Extension1]
id=THE ID OF THE SECOND EXTENSION
file=THE XPI OF THE SECOND EXTENSION.XPI
Version=0.0.0
OS=ALL

Most of this is self explanatory. The only interesting part is OS. If for some reason, you need an add-on to be OS specific, put the OS name instead of ALL. You can see the OS names here.

Once we’ve made all these customizations, we can follow the instructions in my previous post to package our installer. Also, if you want your installer to say “Mozilla Firefox for Your Company”, don’t forget that you can do that using the setup.ini that is mentioned in that previous post. That’s in localized/distribution, NOT nonlocalized/distribution.

So in summary, while I usually plug the CCK Wizard, if all you need to do is set some default prefs, add some bookmarks, bundle some search engines and bundle some add-ons, the distribution method might be for you. If you need to do more detailed customizations, check out the CCK Wizard.

And as always, if you need help with any of this, you can contact Kaply Consulting.

Standard disclaimer: Under no circumstances should you use this information to create a custom Firefox install and redistribute it to anyone outside your organization. If you want more information, you can consult the Mozilla Foundation Trademark Policy.

What tools do I need to work with the Firefox installer?

The primary tool you need is 7-Zip. I install the MozillaBuild package which gives me all the tools I need. Even though the Firefox Installer is NSIS based, we will not need to use NSIS for most customizations. I’ll talk a little bit about the end about what kinds of things you would need NSIS to do.

How do I unpack the Firefox installer?

The Firefox installer is created using 7-Zip. So you can grab any of the Windows installers that end in EXE and unpack them. Any of the Windows installers on the Firefox download page will work. Once you’ve downloaded the EXE, create a temporary directory and type:

7z x "Firefox Setup 3.6.3.exe"

This will unpack the contents of the installer so we can modify it.

How do I bundle my extension with the Firefox installer?

Bundling your extension with the Firefox installer is just a matter of putting it in the right place. Then when we package up the installer at the end, it will get installed along with Firefox. For most extensions, the right place is nonlocalized/extensions. Inside that directory, create a subdirectory that corresponds to the ID of the extension you want to preinstall with Firefox. Then unzip the XPI into that directory. You can find the ID by looking at the install.rdf file inside the XPI. You can add as many extensions as you want into the installer.

What are some useful extensions I can bundle with Firefox

I’ve created two extensions that create interesting things to bundle with Firefox. The first is the CCK Wizard. The CCK Wizard can be used to change various defaults in Firefox so that you can customize it for deployment in your organization. The second is Rebrand. Rebrand allows you to change the internal branding used in Firefox.

Can I change the names used in the installer?

Yes, you can change the names used in the installer. To do this, you need to create a directory called distribution inside the localized directory that was created when you unpacked the installer. Create a file called setup.ini in this directory. Here’s what it looks like:

[Branding]
BrandFullName=Mike's Browser
BrandShortName=Browser

BrandFullName will be used to replace “Mozilla Firefox” and BrandShortName will be used to replace “Firefox”.

Can I change the images used in the installer?

Yes, you can change the images used in the installer. In that same directory where you put the setup.ini, you can put two files, modern-wizard.bmp and modern-header.bmp. The first images corresponds to the large image on the first page of the installer. The second image corresponds to the small image that is used on later pages of the installer. You can use the linked images as a reference to know what size to make these images.

How do I repackage the installer?

To repackage the installer, first you need to zip up the changes that you made. Type:

7z a -r -t7z app.7z -mx -m0=BCJ2 -m1=LZMA:d24 -m2=LZMA:d19 -m3=LZMA:d19 -mb0:1 -mb0s1:2 -mb0s2:3

This will create a file called app.7z that has all the changes we made. Now we need to package that file with some other files to create the final EXE. We’ll need the file 7zSD.sfx which you can download from Mozilla. And we’ll need a file called app.tag which you can create. It looks like this:

;!@Install@!UTF-8!
Title="Mozilla Firefox"
RunProgram="setup.exe"
;!@InstallEnd@!

Once we have these files, we can run the command:

copy /B 7zSD.sfx+app.tag+app.7z our_new_installer.exe

to package them all as an EXE. Don’t forget the /B. It indicates that the files are binary so Windows won’t put an EOF marker on them.

Can I change the defaults that are set in the installer like the install directory or the checkboxes?

At this time, there is no way to change the defaults in the installer without rebuilding the installer. There’s a bug open on this with a patch, so hopefully this will be fixed for Firefox 4.

Can I make my totally rebranded Firefox coexist nicely with an existing Firefox?

There are a couple ways to do this. The easiest way is to use the -no-remote parameter when you start Firefox. This causes the Firefox you are starting to not connect to the Firefox that is currently running. When you do this, you have to specify a different profile using the -P parameter. Alternatively, you can change the internal identifiers that Firefox uses. Then it will be considered to be a completely different browser. If you choose to do this, you should be aware that you will not receive updates and there will be other side effects. This is not a decision that should be taken lightly. Also, your profiles will be stored in different locations as well. If you want to do this, check out the file application.ini in the nonlocalized directory. The variables you want to change are Vendor and Name. Again, you do this at your own risk.

What can I do if I’m willing to rebuild the installer with NSIS?

If you are willing to rebuild the installer, you can change things like the name of the entry in the Add/Remove programs list, as well as the install directory and other defaults. This is a nontrivial exercise because some of the required files are built as part of the Mozilla build proces and are not available in the build tree. If you’re really interested in doing this, you can contact Kaply Consulting and we can talk about it.

I hope this answered some questions folks have. If anyone has any more questions, please don’t hesistate to ask.

Unfortunately Mozilla removed the ability for an add-on to hide itself in Firefox 3.6.

Luckily working around this is very easy and will be included in the next version of the CCK Wizard. In order to make this work, I’m going to provide one option that hides the add-on. Lock and hide will no longer be separate. This seems rather logical since the lock option is pretty useless by itself.

Note that none of these options work unless the add-on is installed in the same directory where the Firefox executable is located.

• Updated for new Firefox 3.6 proxy panel
• Two CCKs can now coexist (Company Identifiers must be unique to each CCK)
• Bundling XPIs and JARs no longer uses XPI bundles – they are explicitly installed upon first run of the CCK (please test this if you bundle multple XPIs)
• All translated CCK Wizards should now be working
• First run screen added to CCK Wizard install
• A few bugs fixed

Some other items of note:

As I mentioned before, I’ve moved CCK Wizard development to Google Code. Please feel free to open up bugs there.

Going forward, I’m going to add the ability to do more locking down of functionality in Firefox. If you have specific needs, please open bugs in Google Code.

To close this post out, I want to answer a couple questions about CCK Wizard that are asked a lot.

What is the right way to install the CCK?

There are multiple ways the CCK can be installed based on your needs. I’ll go through all those ways.

Standard install – The XPI that is created by the CCK Wizard is just a Firefox extension, so as such it can be placed on a web page and users can simply click to install. You can get more information on how to do this from the Mozilla developer center.

In the Firefox directory – Extensions can be installed directly into the Firefox directory. Inside of the directory where the Firefox executable is located, there is a directory called extensions. Inside this directory, you can create a directory with the same ID as your CCK and then unzip your CCK into that directory. This is the only location where you can hide the add-on.

As part of a Firefox install – I’ve previously documented how to bundle the CCK in the installer and how to package the installer on Windows. These instructions still hold true.

Globally – There are designated locations in different operating systems where extensions can be installed and they are picked up by Firefox. You can get more information on these locations at the Mozilla Developer Center. This involves unzipping the CCK package in a specific location on the users hard drive into a directory that is named the same as the ID of the CCK. Using this method, you can manage the CCK package centrally and the user cannot uninstall the CCK from Firefox.

Via the Windows Registry – If you are on Windows, extensions can be installed via the Windows registry. This is documented at the Mozilla Developer Center. This involves unzipping the CCK package that you created to a central location and then adding a registry key that tells Firefox where to find the CCK. Using this method, you can manage the CCK package centrally and the user cannot uninstall the CCK from Firefox.

What do the options “Do not show this extension in the extension manager” and “Prevent the uninstall of this extension” do? They don’t seem to work for me.

These options only work if your CCK is located in the extensions directory where the Firefox executable is located.

If you have any more questions, feel free to ask in the comments.

Do you need to do even more customization of Firefox for your organization? That’s what we do. Contact Kaply Consulting.

Most interesting news on the CCK front is that I’ve decided to move it to Google Code instead of maintaining in the Mozilla trees. The URL is http://code.google.com/p/ff-cckwizard/. My primary reason for doing this is honestly that I’m not really contributing to Mozilla/Firefox proper anymore and messing with Mercurial isn’t worth it for me (I know, lame excuse.) It has some other advantages, though, like having my own bug reporting system and not having to get any reviews/approvals for checkins.

So if you have ideas/suggestions/bugs for the CCK Wizard, please open them in Google Code.

Also note that CCK Wizard is something I do on the side, so my time is limited. Contributions help. I know there are a lot of folks who depend on this for the business. Any and all love is appreciated.

CCK Wizard version 1.2.5

Here’s a summary of what’s changed:

• Dropped support for Firefox 2
• Added support for specifying sites where cookies are always allowed
• Added support for specifying sites to deny popups/installs/cookies
• Rewrote CCKService XPCOM Component to be a little cleaner
• Fixed problem where sometimes a created CCK wouldn’t install (ZIP path problem)
• Fixed problem where sometimes bookmarks weren’t created on first load
• Fixed problem where bookmarks weren’t created in the same order as specified in the CCK Wizard
• Made the additional help menu look better on Mac

Enjoy!

CCK Wizard 1.2

Enjoy!

FYI, I’m making a beta of the CCK Wizard available today for Firefox 3.

If you are deploying Firefox in your enterprise, educational institution, or even your household, you’ll want to check out the CCK Wizard (info at that link is a little dated right now).The CCK Wizard is an implementation of the old Netscape CCK that allows you to customize various aspects of Firefox and then contain all of those customizations in a single Firefox extension. Here are some of the things you can do

• Add an identifier to the user agent string
• Change the default home page and startup override home page
• Change the title bar text
• Change the animated logo
• Add a web page and tooltip used for the animated logo
• Add a help menu item that links to a web page
• Provide sites for which popups and XPInstalls are allowed by default
• Preinstall browser plug-ins
• Preinstall search engines
• Change the default search engine
• Add folders, bookmarks and live bookmarks to the personal toolbar
• Add folders, bookmarks and live bookmarks to the bookmarks folder
• Set default preferences
• Lock preferences
• Add registry keys (Windows only)
• Add certificates (See NOTE below)
• Set default proxy configurations
• Package other XPIs with your distribution
• Disable about:config

Note that if you customize Firefox using the CCK Wizard, there are certain restrictions on redistribution outside of your organization, especially if you add certificates. Read the Mozilla Foundation Trademark policies for more info, or contact licensing@mozilla.org.

And please let me know if you find any bugs.