Features/Platform/Chrome-only Plugins

Status

Team

Open issues/risks

`

Stage 1: Definition

1. Feature overview

Currently when an extension ships an NPAPI plugin, it is automatically available to web content. This feature would make it possible for extension to ship plugins which are only available to chrome, or in the case of SDK-based addons, only available to that particular addon.

2. Users & use cases

Extension authors are the primary target for this feature. This mirrors a feature provided by Google Chrome and provides a way for extensions to interact with native code which can be easier to use than ctypes and make use of existing plugin-development frameworks.

3. Dependencies

`

4. Requirements

`

Non-goals

`

Stage 2: Design

5. Functional specification

Instead of automatically installing all plugins from the plugins/ subdirectory of addons, require plugins to mentioned in the addons manifest file. Then registration modifiers can be used to modify the scope of plugin installation.

The chrome.manifest format would gain the following additional directive:

plugin <path-to-pluginDLL>

Plugins would be "chrome-private" by default. To make a plugin accessible to web content, use the modifier:

plugin <path-to-pluginDLL> public=true

Whether and how we can restrict plugins to particular jetpack addons is still TBD.

6. User experience design

`

Stage 3: Planning

7. Implementation plan

`

8. Reviews

Security review

`

Privacy review

`

Localization review

`

Accessibility

`

Quality Assurance review

`

Operations review

`

Stage 4: Development

9. Implementation

`

Stage 5: Release

10. Landing criteria

`

Feature details

Team status notes

See http://code.google.com/chrome/extensions/npapi.html for the equivalent Google Chrome feature/information.

bug 702132.