Mozilla Labs' Jetpack: add features to Firefox using only the tech of the Web | Hacker News Reader

Mozilla Labs' Jetpack: add features to Firefox using only the tech of the Web

jetpack.mozillalabs.com

47 pointsuggedal17 comments

I'm impressed by Mozilla choosing to integrate jQuery and the Firebug Console: https://jetpack.mozillalabs.com/api.html

John Resig works at Mozilla.

It actually had nothing to do with it - I only found out about this the other week. I'm not complaining, though!

As I understand it, it was more a logical extension of Ubiquity's functionality and API (Ubiquity uses jQuery to simplify a number of interactions).

What a beautiful API for Chrome manipulation! Can't wait for it to be part of the browser. More generally, it's really exciting to see how seriously Mozilla takes extensions as an integral part of the web experience. It's cutting edge in a way Chrome and IE haven't really begun to explore.

One piece that's missing for me, however, is the lack of innovation in sharing/discoverability of extensions. For example, I'd love to be able to write a quick script for news.YC, be able to share it, and let others discover it with <5 clicks...

I don't see how this is different than Greasemonkey (other than addition of HTML/CSS). Is this more of a control issue due to Greasemonkey ported to Chrome?

I may be wrong but this extension shows more API's than Greasemonkey does. You're able to use Firefox's statusbar, tabs and notifications.

It has some extra functionality, but it also looks like it has less. There doesn't appear to be a way to execute cross-domain XHRs yet.

Use jquery for cross-domain xhr.

That's passable, but Greasemonkey does it in a more secure way than script tags, and it supports more features, like setting headers.

http://wiki.greasespot.net/GM_xmlhttpRequest

This isn't using "script tags," it's using the (relatively) new Cross-Site XMLHttpRequest: http://ejohn.org/blog/cross-site-xmlhttprequest/

Oh, that's nifty. I vaguely remember hearing about that, but I guess I'm so used to having to avoid using shiny new things that when the opportunity actually arises with extension code, it's hard to recall. Thanks for the info.

The big difference is that JetPack has a simple API to manipulate the browser chrome. There will always be some things that the existing extension model allows that JetPack would have problems delivering, but it allows a huge subset of extensions that just need to execute some JS, maybe tweak some chrome, and display some content to be much simpler for people to develop without having to learn XUL.

A rival to Google's Chrome Extension API?

http://dev.chromium.org/developers/design-documents/extensio...

Looks cool, but of course you would need to get potential users of your addon to install jetpack first. Will be great when/if this becomes a core part of the browser.

Yes, but it will eventually become part of the browser once the API is mature. Most Mozilla Labs projects have the goal of integrating with Firefox whenever possible (like Ubiquity).

Has there been any word on the slated time for Taskfox? Furthermore, has any real work been done on the work with command name collisions?

I find it ironic that they're targeting "anyone who can build a Web site" & their first demo is ad blocking!

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