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Customizing Firefox Updates w/o Losing Bookmarks

  • February 19, 2015
  • 6 replies
  • 32 views
J
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Hello All,

I'm in a bit of a predicament and seeking your advice. I would like to keep our environment of about 400 macs updated with Firefox as Mozilla releases updates. My goal is to update Firefox on each machine without losing everyone's personalized bookmarks. I am able to do this just fine, but I also want to customize the update to turn off "Update Notifications" popups. This is to prevent tens of help desk tickets from being submitted every time employees see the annoying "Update Available" pop up on their screens. I have been able to create a policy that disables the "Update Available" popup by using a snapshot in composer. However, by creating the snapshot, everyone's personal bookmarks are lost after deploying the new package.

Does anyone know of a way to create a Firefox package without losing bookmarks, and disabling the "Update Available" notification?

Best answer by stevewood

@jstine There have been several discussions on JAMF Nation about this over the years. You can edit the channel-prefs.js file found in the Firefox app bundle:

https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=6830#respond

Or the method I use is one that @gregneagle wrote about on his blog a few years ago, and that is to create a config for my company's settings:

https://managingosx.wordpress.com/2008/08/18/firefox-default-settings/

Also discussed here:

https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=9543#respond

Your basic steps would be:

- updated Firefox on a machine
- make the config changes mentioned above to that Firefox installation
- Drag the Firefox.app file out of /Applications and into Composer
- Make a PKG or DMG in Composer

You do not need to do a snapshot in Composer to do this, just drag and drop the app bundle. That will leave the user folders untouched and only update the actual app.

Hope that helps.

    6 replies

    stevewood
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    • stevewood
    • Hall of Fame
    • Answer
    • February 19, 2015

    @jstine There have been several discussions on JAMF Nation about this over the years. You can edit the channel-prefs.js file found in the Firefox app bundle:

    https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=6830#respond

    Or the method I use is one that @gregneagle wrote about on his blog a few years ago, and that is to create a config for my company's settings:

    https://managingosx.wordpress.com/2008/08/18/firefox-default-settings/

    Also discussed here:

    https://jamfnation.jamfsoftware.com/discussion.html?id=9543#respond

    Your basic steps would be:

    - updated Firefox on a machine
    - make the config changes mentioned above to that Firefox installation
    - Drag the Firefox.app file out of /Applications and into Composer
    - Make a PKG or DMG in Composer

    You do not need to do a snapshot in Composer to do this, just drag and drop the app bundle. That will leave the user folders untouched and only update the actual app.

    Hope that helps.

    RobertHammen
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    • RobertHammen
    • Esteemed Contributor
    • February 19, 2015

    Manage Firefox with CCK2 plugin. There's even an AutoPKG recipe to take your .zip file of settings and download new versions of Firefox and automagically integrate your settings into that app package.

    We do things like disable automatic updates, disable saved passwords, etc.

    J
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    • jstine
    • Author
    • Contributor
    • February 19, 2015

    @stevewood thank you, this is exactly what I was looking for!

    B
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    • BaddMann
    • Contributor
    • February 20, 2015

    @RobertHammen

    What's the recipe called and which repo?

    K
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    • Kaltsas
    • Valued Contributor
    • February 20, 2015

    Second CCK2. I deploy the ESR with the home page set, our proxy certificates imported, and updates disabled. Since the CCK2 files are bundled into the Firefox app it doesn't affect the user settings. It only takes me a minute to drop the CCK files in the ESR release and drop it on Packages (which will generate a package from a self contained application if you drag it onto it).

    I need to look at the autoPKG recipe @RobertHammen mentioned. I've been doing it by hand but if I can shave off a minute that's a minute I have to do something else.

    B
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    • BaddMann
    • Contributor
    • February 20, 2015

    I looked it up.

    Using the "autopkg search firefox" command I found this:

    FirefoxAutoconfig.munki.recipe gregneagle-recipes Mozilla/FirefoxAutoconfig.munki.recipe FirefoxAutoconfig.pkg.recipe gregneagle-recipes Mozilla/FirefoxAutoconfig.pkg.recipe

    Greg Neagle himself Created it!! So add his repo with "autopkg repo-add gregneagle-recipes"

    Then get a neat look at the pkg.recipe with "autopkg info FirefoxAutoconfig.pkg.recipe"

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