Adding 3rd-party add-ons

[cyberreine]

Hi. Firefox 11.0 is currently my default browser, but I'm trying out Pale Moon 11.0.1 in the hope that I can use it as my default on my Win7 64-bit computer. To do that, I need to be able to use some add-ons and plug-ins that are from 3rd-party programs and are not listed in Mozilla's list of add-ons. For example, an add-on for Surfulater and one for Linkman, and a plug-in for my PDF reader, PDF-XChange Viewer. I have all these on Firefox. My question is how can I put them on Pale Moon if I don't want to import my entire Firefox profile? Is there a way to import just the plug-ins and add-ons info from the Firefox profile? Or a way to add them without using the Firefox profile at all?

Thanks in advance for your help.

[Moonchild]

It depends a little how the third-party add-ons are programmed. If they drop an .xpi file in your Firefox profile folder (in /extensions), then it should be as simple as copying that over to your Pale Moon profile folder in the same folder. The same goes for plug-ins, they usually go (as a .dll) in your Firefox profile folder under /plugins.

It's possible that the add-ons or plugins aren't following the standard way of doing things in which case it's best to ask the support team of the individual plugin/addon for assistance. And of course you could ask them as well to add support for Pale Moon in their installers while you're there

[megaman]

Hi. Firefox 11.0 is currently my default browser, but I'm trying out Pale Moon 11.0.1 in the hope that I can use it as my default on my Win7 64-bit computer. To do that, I need to be able to use some add-ons and plug-ins that are from 3rd-party programs and are not listed in Mozilla's list of add-ons. For example, an add-on for Surfulater and one for Linkman, and a plug-in for my PDF reader, PDF-XChange Viewer. I have all these on Firefox. My question is how can I put them on Pale Moon if I don't want to import my entire Firefox profile? Is there a way to import just the plug-ins and add-ons info from the Firefox profile? Or a way to add them without using the Firefox profile at all?

Thanks in advance for your help.

I recommend Foxit PDF reader, since it works on both browsers without a hitch.

FF 14 will have a built-in PDF reader, so the PDF reader thing will be less of a problem. (Of course you can still use PDF-XChange for full features)

[cyberreine]

It depends a little how the third-party add-ons are programmed. If they drop an .xpi file in your Firefox profile folder (in /extensions), then it should be as simple as copying that over to your Pale Moon profile folder in the same folder. The same goes for plug-ins, they usually go (as a .dll) in your Firefox profile folder under /plugins.

It's possible that the add-ons or plugins aren't following the standard way of doing things in which case it's best to ask the support team of the individual plugin/addon for assistance. And of course you could ask them as well to add support for Pale Moon in their installers while you're there

Thanks very much, Moonchild, for your response. It turns out that the PDF-Xchange Viewer plug-in magically appeared in Pale Moon's plug-ins listing, so that's no longer an issue. However, the Surfulater and Linkman add-ons are still a problem. You said that they might "drop an .xpi file in your Firefox profile folder (in /extensions)," but that folder had only a long, obscurely named sub-folder which contained just three files: icon.png, install.rdf, and preview.png. There were no .xpi files. I poked around and found that Surfulater puts its Firefox file into C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\SAIG\Surfulater\FirefoxExtension\. That folder contained a sub-folder called 3.42.10 (the current Surfulater version number). It contained two files--chrome.manifest and install.rdf--plus a folder called chrome, which contained a file called surfulater.jar. I tried various ways to move those elements into Pale Moon, but nothing worked. I don't know whether the file chrome.manifest in the Surfulater directory contains vital information for making this work, but it turns out that Pale Moon needed the chrome.manifest file that it (Pale Moon) had installed. It couldn't use the one in Surfulater's directory. Anyway, to make a long story longer, nothing I did would get Surfulater to work with Pale Moon.

I had similar lack of success fiddling with Linkman. Linkman's options has a place for the user to tell it where to find a variety of browsers that need to work with Linkman, but of course there's no place for Pale Moon, and my attempt to use a slot that was set aside for Netscape Navigator|Sea Monkey didn't work.
I'll try to contact the developers, but I'm not optimistic. Unless I'm able to get both of those programs to work with Pale Moon, I'm afraid I will have to remove Pale Moon from my computer.

I gave some thought to moving the entire Firefox profiles to Pale Moon, but I have two reservations:
1) One reason I was interested in Pale Moon is that FF's performance is getting more and more problematic. Moving the profile may therefore just transfer some of FF's weaknesses to Pale Moon.
2) What happens when a new add-on is issued by Surfulater or Linkman to deal with a new version of FF/Pale Moon? Won't I encounter the same problems then that I'm facing now?

I'd welcome any further thoughts/suggestions that you or anyone else might have. Thanks again.

[megaman]

Name your palemoon.exe to firefox.exe and see if it detects the add-on. When it does, just change the .exe back to Palemoon?
Crazy idea, I know, but worth a shot.

Edit: So Surfulater does not leave a mark in the Firefox folder? A .dll perhaps? (Curious question, most likely that the answer is "no.")

[cyberreine]

Hi, Megaman. Thanks for your response. Alas, renaming palemoon.exe to firefox.exe and rebooting did not fool Surfulater. And, to answer your question, no, as far as I can tell, Surfulater puts all its FF files in C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Roaming\SAIG\Surfulater\FirefoxExtension\ .

[Moonchild]

I've had a look at surfulater, and I understand that it's payware. Understandable that you would insist on using it
Since they use a GUID, it should be possible to plug it into Pale Moon without needing a file copy.

I can have a more in-depth look at it later on. If surfulater is smart though, they will add pale Moon support - it should be real easy for them to add considering the add-on system is exactly the same as Firefox, but the profile path is different.

FYI: the GUID of the extension is {E37148EA-820B-441d-8305-04583F91CF6B}
Possibly, adding it to extensions.enabledaddons in about:config is all that is needed:

type about:config in the address bar and press enter
find the parameter extensions.enabledAddons
double-click it, and at the end, add a comma and the GUID with version number:

Code: Select all

,{E37148EA-820B-441d-8305-04583F91CF6B}:3.42.10

This may or may not work - as said I can have a look in-depth later.

[Moonchild]

What may also work is opening the attached file (which is the firefox extension packed as xpi) in Pale Moon with file -> open

[cyberreine]

Moonchild, thank you VERY VERY MUCH!! I downloaded and opened the .xpi file you provided, and I've now got Surfulater working in Pale Moon. And tech support from Linkman helped me get Linkman to work as well, so I'm now good to go! I'm delighted, and very grateful for your help.