Yesterday I wrote a post about building Firefox extensions in Mac OS. Unfortunately the script didn’t work perfectly so I have updated it now.

The most important change is about the hidden file .DS_Store in Mac OS. When zipping a file (also via the Terminal) Mac OS includes this file and as a result of that you Firefox extensions is notworking anymore..

The second part that is changed is the last rule. This rule installs the extension automatically and restarts Firefox. Well, if that ain’t easy! ;-)

Extensions build script updated is a post from: arjansnaterse.nl

Now and then I play some with Firefox extensions. While doing that I use a batch file that creates the XPI files easily. No problems this far.

But…. A few weeks ago I got my new Macbook and I love it. The only thing was that I couldn’t use the batch file anymore. So I adjusted the batch file and converted it to a shell script. Here’s the code:

:
# @(#) --Builds Firefox extensions
BASELOC=$PWD
EXTENSION=$1
 
mkdir build
mkdir ./build/chrome
cd ./chrome
rm .DS_Store
zip -r $EXTENSION.jar ./
 
mv $EXTENSION.jar .././build/chrome
cd $BASELOC
 
cp ./install.* ./build
cp ./update.* ./build
cp ./*.manifest ./build
mkdir ./build/defaults
mkdir ./build/defaults/preferences
cd ./defaults/preferences
cp ./*.* ../../build/defaults/preferences
cd ../../build
 
rm .DS_Store
zip -r $EXTENSION.xpi ./*
mv $EXTENSION.xpi ../
cd ../
rm -r ./build
 
## Restart Firefox and install extension
killall firefox-bin && /Applications/Firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox -install-global-extension $PWD/$EXTENSION.xpi && open -a Firefox

Save this file as build.sh and place it in the directory where you are developing the extension. Now open the Terminal, browse to the right path and make this file executable:

chmod +x ./build.sh

To build your Firefox extension use the following code in the terminal:

./build.sh name_of_extension

Everything is working so far? Cool! Now you have something which makes the extension development in Mac OS X a lot easier! If not, please leave a comment or contact me.

Good luck with it!

Build script for Firefox extensions in Mac OS X is a post from: arjansnaterse.nl