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For your next side project, make a browser extension

geoffreylitt.com

31–40 of 286 posts

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#31
Funny to see this. I recently worked on a browser extension[0] to expand Twitter.com's functionality as well, specifically to connect it to Mastodon and show Mastodon posts amongst ordinary tweets.

It was a lot of fun to build this, though dealing with the oddities of Chrome was frustrating at times. Especially when it comes to permission granularity.

[0] - https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/mastodon-chirper/l...

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#32

PSA: If you're making a browser extension, please support Firefox as well, not just Chrome. Firefox makes it easy since they support the `chrome` namespace for functions [0]. You can also use React/Next.js or another frontend library too if you prefer. I had created an extension a while ago out of pure HTML, CSS, and TypeScript but I found that was quite annoying to add more complex features with lots of state. I swi…

The problem with supporting Firefox is that it doesn't yet support manifest v3. I know this support is coming, but seeing as Chrome right now disallows new extensions that don't use v3 it feels pretty delayed. It's also unclear how to test manifest v3 Firefox extensions before the support is officially out there (though maybe there isn't even beta support yet?)

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#33

PSA: If you're making a browser extension, please support Firefox as well, not just Chrome. Firefox makes it easy since they support the `chrome` namespace for functions [0]. You can also use React/Next.js or another frontend library too if you prefer. I had created an extension a while ago out of pure HTML, CSS, and TypeScript but I found that was quite annoying to add more complex features with lots of state. I swi…

firefox/mozilla doesn't really make it easy (compared to chrome)

mozilla now requires "add-on signing" [0]; extensions now have to be "signed" (By mozilla) before you can permanently side-load your own private extension onto regular firefox. they also require you to use 2FA [1] when setting up a firefox.com account (which is required in order for you to upload extensions so they can be signed).

at least with chrome you can just enable 'developer mode' and drag and drop your own extensions and use it right away without having to deal with any of that.

[0] https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2020/03/10/support-for-exten...

[1] https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2021/03/11/two-factor-authen...

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Legalities of this? They seem to be getting away with it. The US government runs PACER itself, they don't contract it to a profit-motivated third-party. [1] As a result, they're pretty lenient. At one point, their website said: "The information gathered from the PACER system is a matter of public record and may be reproduced without permission". So it's totally legal. The RECAP people also make it _really_ easy to…

Thanks, didn't know all that. I put in the "legalities" part mainly because I was thinking of a similar extension to defeat Elsevier & other vultures of scientific publication. Those people might be more litigious.

It's good to be wary.

My home province gave a private company a 50+ year monopoly on our land title records. I would _love_ something like RECAP for our land title records...but I suspect it's not possible to do it without violating the usage agreement that gets you the record in the first place.

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#35
post #28

No, don't. They're not that hard to code, but both Google and Mozilla keep making changes and then bitching at you through their app stores to change your thing. I recently dropped Chrome support on an add-on because 90% of the users were on Firefox. Since it blocked some ads, I figured Google would continue to whine, and it wasn't worth the hassle.

Interesting, based on browser share I'd have expected 90% to be on Chrome instead. What's the extension (or rather, why are most on Firefox)?

Because Firefox users install more extensions than Chrome users do. Or at least they used to. I don't really care; it's an old project I keep going for existing users.

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#36
post #18
post #13

no dont. I would like to see less people doing browser extensions, and more people writing simple servers. so many companies offering free tier, it would be helpful for people to share who they chose and why, and for people to swap recommendations. extensions allow you to bypass the same-origin policy, but they dont give you the full power of a server. plus with a server, you can choose any language you want, you are…

Hating on JS and suggesting people write servers aren’t very constructive suggestions. A browser extension is just a client, you can back it with the “full power” of a server if you want.

[flagged]

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#37

To extend the idea a bit…iOS shortcuts should be considered “extensions” by the same token. They’re incredibly easy to make and can create a lot of value, plus they’re shareable. As an example…I built https://SimplifyRecipe.com/shortcut in a couple hours and it’s been extremely useful for getting rid of the life story on recipe pages. Lots of people connected with that concept, so now I’m working on building a full-f…

This is really useful shortcut, thanks for sharing! Do you have any good resources for getting started with iOS shortcut apps like this?

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#38
I believed in stuff built on top of browser platform too and had written something useful for me and it turns out a few dozen more people through the Chrome store. Then Google for some ideological reason related to PWAs killed the Chrome Apps platform and all of a sudden, a great way to distribute functionality just disappeared.

https://blog.chromium.org/2020/01/moving-forward-from-chrome...

Apparently it is now alive-ish (there seem to be a set of follow up announcements) but was burnt.

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#39
post #13

no dont. I would like to see less people doing browser extensions, and more people writing simple servers. so many companies offering free tier, it would be helpful for people to share who they chose and why, and for people to swap recommendations. extensions allow you to bypass the same-origin policy, but they dont give you the full power of a server. plus with a server, you can choose any language you want, you are…

On top of the language/toolkit restrictions, I'm not a huge fan of writing browser extensions simply because of the limitations they pose compared to just about anything else… server side app, static SPA, electron, and native desktop/mobile are all so much more capable that when ideas spring up, those are the platforms they tend toward.

I think though that if browser extensions broadly became capable of browser UI overhauls like Firefox extensions used to be, I'd be much much more interested. Most of the things I want to change about web browsing are in the browser, not the web, and making those changes by way of extension is far more practical than the nightmare of maintaining a browser fork.

Re: For your next side project, make a browser extension

#40
post #23

Any suggestions for a good stack to develop extensions? I'm coming from nodejs/react, and would like to stay close to that. Is there an up-to-date stack I can clone, copy, and deploy with something like 'yarn run build' and start hacking?

Shameless plug, but we built the Plasmo Framework to make that (and a lot more) super easy: https://github.com/plasmohq/plasmo
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