WebExtensions/Roadmap

This is an initial roadmap of WebExtensions.

Status: draft, in progress.

WebExtensions exist at the time of writing of this page. They exist in Nightly, but as APIs get written they get added to Nightly and pushed through the trains.

WebExtensions 1.0

Focuses of the first release:

• quality, stability and a base for many add-ons to move to
• parity with Google Chrome and others on some (but not all APIs)
• ability to build key add-ons that are not part of

Application support:

• Firefox
• Firefox for Android (where APIs are appropriate)

APIs

Focus on key APIs that bring the biggest return for investment. Currently these are: alarms, browserAction, extension, i18n, notifications, runtime, storage, tabs, webNavigation and windows APIs. For the full list, look at the tracking bug 1214433

Development tools

Authors of WebExtensions add-ons should be able to develop easily their add-on locally, with support from tools like `jpm`. All APIs should be documented.

AMO

WebExtensions will be able to be uploaded to addons.mozilla.org then reviewed, searched, installed and updated just like any other Addon 1210037

Timeline

By the end of Q2 2016.

Deprecations

We don't anticipate that this release will cause any deprecations of other ways of building add-ons, although certainly we'd hope most resource will go into this release.

WebExtensions idea scratch pad

This is our area to free form work through upcoming ideas, a scratch pad for priority & planning

• native.js - making it easy/faster for folks to prototype webextensions to build API’s
  • with this we can dev in 2 weeks and have big benefit from this for a long time.
    • goal: tested, prototyped, pushed into mozcentral when ready “ideatown for webextension api’s” (Philip, Andy, John G - since similar to ideatown)
  • timing: UX work after e10s interface bug 1181835
  • what is in development? about:config list add-ons using native js
• chrome parity
• chrome add-ons porting
  • top 20 chrome add-ons run in Fx
• firefox add-ons porting
  • top 20 firefox add-ons running in WebExtensions - criteria based on downloads, actual usage, ratings: typically adblockers, download managers, tab add-ons, etc.
• eg: the SDK proposal from Luca
• unique to Firefox features - get ideas in this cycle for next….
  • driven by add-ons need
  • ex: Bug 1244789 - Support richer user interactions in the chrome.browserAction API (Giorgio dev side / aswan andy would like to help engage here, madhava, markus)
• go faster - early feasibility planning starting
  • feasibility (can we do it, difficulty, when good time)
  • open issues as it's ramping up (laura's team)
• runtime.connectnative
• Styling & sort order - UX is lower priority for now