NPAPI:GuidAttribute

Status

Under Consideration

Problem Summary

Nearly 100% of all users have at least one plugin installed. Keeping them up to date is not a trivial task as most have multi-step installers and knowing where and how to get the latest version is not clear. The Mozilla Plugins Database is a central repository for tracking plugin versions and installer locations.

Currently plugin detection via Mozilla's Plugin Checker (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/plugincheck/) is based on the plugin's name and mimetype. This makes detection difficult as the algorithm to match plugins is not trivial (https://wiki.mozilla.org/PFS2#General_Algorithm). A unique method of identifying plugins via a guid (similar to addons on addons.mozilla.org) allows for a very simple API for browsers to use to find updates to installed plugins.

Existing Discussions and Documentation

Related Documentation

• General plugins docs
• PFS2 Documentation (plugins db)

API Requirements

• Adding a 'guid' attribute

Current Proposal

• Last modified: July 27, 2010
• Author: Ryan Doherty (Mozilla)

Open Issues

• Who would generate guids?
  • Since guids are unique, plugin vendors can generate them on their own.
• Can this simply be handled via NPP_GetValue (https://developer.mozilla.org/en/NPP_GetValue)?
• Guid format?
  • human readable or http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc4122.html