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A couple of years ago we changed from using Internet Explorer 6 to Firefox 3.0.5. We are now way overdue updating Firefox and I am a little stuck for how to do it without walking around to everyone’s computer . . . which I don’t really want to do.

Our current installation includes a couple of add-ons (like IE Tab, Adblock Plus, and No-Script to name a few), bookmarks, and a couple of settings (preferences) otherwise.

I am looking for an easy way to upgrade all of our installs. We don’t use Group Policy and I don’t have any experience with packaging software for distribution which limits me a little I’m afraid.

I was hoping to be able to do a clean install of the software, configure it as I see fit, and then copy the configuration and preference files to each PC. I don’t know if this will work and I don’t know the proper files to copy. I imagine this solution works best for fresh installs which is fine if you can suggest a way.

As far as the upgrade goes my add-ons will make this difficult I’m afraid. I’d like to remove No-Script, IE Tab is no longer compatible and will need to be replaced with IE Tab 2, and Adblock Plus will just need to be upgraded. I’m not really sure how to do this either.

I took a look at Mozilla’s BYOB and it’s not complete enough.

I took a look at the CCK add-in and find that it is very complete but not very well documented so I have no idea about how to build a custom browser with it.

Is anyone out there deploying Firefox with Add-Ons and custom preferences? If so, how are you doing it?

Thanks,

MJ

3 Spice ups
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I have never deployed Firefox with addons, but I have deployed it manually before. This will involve a little testing on a couple spare machines if you have them, but I believe you need to create a new user profile just the way you like, and then copy the contents of the Firefox Profile within that User’s directory and paste that into the Default User folder on your other machines. The profiles usually have random names of letters and numbers, which can make deployment difficult.

For the plugins, I would imagine you need to do a similar copy and paste with the “C:\Program Files\Mozilla Firefox\plugins” directories.

Again, I would test this rather extensively, but I have done something similar about a year ago at a different job, and it worked fine with some tweaking. These, however, were manual copy/pastes on about 15 machines that we created for a specific short-term purpose.

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Might take a look into Cameyo.

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Kendall wrote:

Might take a look into Cameyo.

http://www.cameyo.com/

+1 Interesting Find…

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I’ve grappled with the same problem, but reading this thread reminded me that I use Mozbackup on my home computer. It may be possible to use it to take a snapshot of a model machine at work and replicate it via a script. I will have to look into it.

BTW, I push Firefox via a VBS script in a GPO that does a silent install, but it has no customizations or plugins.

I’m amazed every time I look at this problem that Firefox didn’t go the MSI route. It could only help their market share if they made it easier for administrators.

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We deploy a stock MSI (no addons) via GPO which we get from Frontmotion.

http://frontmotion.com

They also offer a Packaging service, in their words:

“You can choose a Firefox version, a language and up to ten extensions. Press a button and in a few minutes you can download your customized package ready for deployment. It is fast, easy and inexpensive compared to any other packaging services.”

Never tried it or looked into the costs, but it might be right up your alley.

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Check out the information available at www.appdeploy.com. You can find references to different versions of Firefox here:

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Guys, thanks for the great links. I was looking seriously at FrontMotion before SteveP put up the link to appdeploy.com

I checked appdeploy a few times prior to posting here but kept finding Firefox 2 and 3 installs. The Firefox 4 link is there and someone was good enough to add a note about incorporating extensions.

I’m not totally interested in packaging MSIs but I think this is the best option. Thanks for the help.

MJ

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Woops, Kendall - don’t know how I missed your post. Cameyo looks great. I’m not sure I’ll use it for this but I use Symantec’s SVS which I don’t think is even offered for free anymore so Cameyo could be a good replacement for it. +1 from me too :slight_smile:

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Kendall wrote:

Might take a look into Cameyo.

http://www.cameyo.com/

+1 Wow, watched the video and that looked sweet. I have a new toy to play with this week!