Firefox to get a "walled garden" for browser extensions

Mozilla to be sole arbiter

[bill]

https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/02/17/firefox-to-get-a-walled-garden-for-browser-extensions-mozilla-to-be-sole-arbiter/ [nakedsecurity.sophos.com]

Firefox to get a "walled garden" for browser extensions, Mozilla to be sole arbiter

Mozilla is the latest vendor, if you will excuse me not referring to it as a foundation or a community, to announce a walled garden for its software ecosystem.

In the second half of 2015, it says, Firefox will require all browser extensions to be digitally signed.

[graeme_p]

Expect to see a fork without this restriction.

Also, what about extensions installed from app stores/repositories. For example Ubuntu comes with FF installed with an extension to work with the Ubuntu top menu and various other integrations - will that still work without causing issues for users?

[incrediBILL]

Walled gardens even have to have a backdoor to let people install things they build themselves.

I wouldn't be too worried because without this exception there won't be any new add-ons developed because you must be able to load custom code.

Even Google Play has a side door for sideloading, and I believe iPhones can do the same. When the Nook first came out they spent more time trying to stop people from sideloading so they had to pay for that walled garden content vs. the same apps free from Google's garden and that backfired and the once highly desired Nook went down in flames.

It cuts both ways.

[piatkow]

As much as I want to be able to get extensions, apps or whatever from the source that I choose I have had too much experience in my working life of trying to re-integrate third party or in-house add-ons whenever software is upgraded. I have never worked out how to square that circle!

[lucy24]

I believe iPhones can do the same

The word you're groping for is "jailbreaking". It applies to everything in iOS, but they won't tell you how to do it.

[graeme_p]

There is a significant difference, because Android lets you sideload apps simply by changing a preference. With iOS you have to jailbreak, equivalent to rooting an Android device, which is a lot more difficult.

Android also works well with alternative app stores - the first thing I do on a new Android device is install f-droid.

[incrediBILL]

Sorry but not all Android allows sideloading.
When we got our first tablet it was a Nook and we could sideload and they blocked it, we rooted, they updated and blocked that, we rooted, again, they tried to block us again. Our mistake was not disabling updates from B&N from day one.

Major mistake messing with customers like that as trying to jail us forced us to get a Nexus 7 when they came out. Otherwise, we might have kept the Nook a little longer, maybe bought their books, movies and music but they got greedy and we left.

That walled garden nonsense might play well with little old ladies that only think rooting is something they do to their potted plants, but for techie people that nonsense doesn't fly.

B&N had a nice cheap little machine and we got one as well as our friends at the time and we've all tossed it.

Trying to be greedy and they wanted all or nothing and they got nothing.

Some companies never learn.