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Do I take a performance hit if I use firefox dev build?

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  • Last reply by TyDraniu

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Hi!

I want to use my own unsigned addon with my daily browsing. But I found out that firefox hates it's user base by making xpinstall.signatures.required option in about:config only available to dev builds.

If I use firefox dev build will I loose on performance? For example is it compiled with debug symbols that slow down code execution? And if so, is it somehow possible to get the release version of firefox where xpinstall.signatures.required is set false so that I would not loose because of dev build?

Hi! I want to use my own unsigned addon with my daily browsing. But I found out that firefox hates it's user base by making xpinstall.signatures.required option in about:config only available to dev builds. If I use firefox dev build will I loose on performance? For example is it compiled with debug symbols that slow down code execution? And if so, is it somehow possible to get the release version of firefox where xpinstall.signatures.required is set false so that I would not loose because of dev build?

All Replies (6)

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1. You can sign your addon for a private use. 2. You can use dev or nightly branch with a fresh profile and sync your data using the Firefox account. You shouldn't notice any perf loss.

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I have that preference in regular Firefox 104.0.2 and have made it false.

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TyDraniu said

1. You can sign your addon for a private use. 2. You can use dev or nightly branch with a fresh profile and sync your data using the Firefox account. You shouldn't notice any perf loss.

1. If I sign it myself then I can use it without dev build? And then I don't have re-install it for each use? Once I install it stays installed forever? 2. Do I need fresh profile? Can I link it against existing profile?

Terry said

I have that preference in regular Firefox 104.0.2 and have made it false.

How exactly did you make it false? You can set it from about:config but it won't have effect.

If you look into C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\omni.ja\modules\addons\AddonSettings.jsm it has code: if (AppConstants.MOZ_REQUIRE_SIGNING && !Cu.isInAutomation) {

 makeConstant("REQUIRE_SIGNING", true);

which overrides xpinstall.signatures.required value with hardcoded true.

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fdoywugozklvsndgax said

1. If I sign it myself then I can use it without dev build? And then I don't have re-install it for each use? Once I install it stays installed forever? 2. Do I need fresh profile? Can I link it against existing profile?

Yes, you can use your signed addon with the release build in existing profile as every other addon.

You can learn more about these options by reading Add-on Distribution and Signing on Firefox Extension Workshop.

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How exactly do I self sign it without submitting it to FF team for code review and without using this web-ext tool (because I don't want to install node for that)?

I found this tutorial. https://addons-server.readthedocs.io/en/latest/topics/api/signing.html

It talks something about guid but link to explanation is broken https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/Install_Manifests#id

How do get that guid? And how do I get that <jwt-token>?

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You can ask addon-specific questions on https://discourse.mozilla.org/c/add-ons/development/108

But I really don't think that they waste resources on human review of so called self-distributed addons.