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uberAgent
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Installing the Firefox Browser Extension

July 9, 2024
Contributed by: 
C

uberAgent’s browser web app performance functionality requires a browser extension to be installed. This article lists the necessary steps for the Firefox extension. The requirements can be found here.

Enabling the Agent Metric

To enable data collection from Firefox make sure uberAgent’s BrowserPerformanceFirefox metric is enabled in the configuration. In the default configuration, BrowserPerformanceFirefox is enabled.

Installing the Firefox Extension

The extension is available from two different channels: release and beta. The release channel gets only fully-tested versions of the extension, while the beta channel additionally gets beta-quality versions.

Manual Installation

For tests and PoCs, it may be easiest to install uberAgent’s Firefox extension manually.

Release Channel

Install the extension from release channel on the Firefox Web Store.

Beta Channel

To install the beta version of the extension:

  1. In Firefox, click here and agree to the terms and conditions
  2. When Firefox asks Allow uberagent.com to install an add-on? select Continue to Installation
  3. When Firefox asks Add uberAgent - beta? select Add
  4. Firefox shows a message indicating that the installation was successful

We recommend putting the majority of users on the release channel and a small minority on the beta channel.

Note: due to a change by Mozilla, beta versions prior to 2.6 cannot upgrade to 2.6+ automatically. Please uninstall older versions of the extension, and then install version 2.6+. This only applies to the beta channel.

The extension version 2.6 or newer initially does not collect any data. To enable data collection click the uberAgent icon in the upper right corner.

Automated Installation

Add-on Deployment

Deployment of uberAgent’s Firefox extension is easily possible with Group Policy (Firefox 60+ required). Please follow the steps in Mozilla’s documentation.

Below is an example JSON code to block the user from installing any extension but force the uberAgent extension installation through Group Policy. Put it in Policies - Administrative Templates - Mozilla - Firefox - Extensions - Extension Management.

{
   "*": {
      "blocked_install_message": "If you need this browser extension, please contact the helpdesk.",
       "installation_mode": "blocked"
   },
   "{2e53b2d2-1bdf-446a-8f9d-9be4173886fe}": {
      "installation_mode": "force_installed",
      "install_url": "https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/downloads/latest/uberagent/latest.xpi"
   }
}
<!--NeedCopy-->

As of 2019-12-02, Mozilla enforces showing a consent dialog to users if an add-on collects information about visited URLs, even if the add-on was deployed through Group Policy.

This change forces us to publish a new version of the add-on that initially does not collect any data. To automatically enable data collection set the new managed storage setting EnableBrowserDataCollection to true. This can be achieved in one of two ways.

Automatically declare consent and enable data collection by running a script to set EnableBrowserDataCollection to true:

  • Make sure that cookies are enabled and Firefox’s setting dom.storage.enabled is set to true
  • Download and unzip this script

  • Run the script with elevated permissions on every endpoint: powershell.exe -executionpolicy bypass -file Set-uberAgentFFEnableBrowserDataCollection.ps1

  • Only upgrade to or install version 2.6+ of uberAgent’s Firefox add-on once the script has been run on all endpoints

If you prefer to change things manually instead of using our script we have you covered, too:

  1. Create the file uAFirefoxSettings.json in uberAgent’s installation directory with the following content: {"name": "{2e53b2d2-1bdf-446a-8f9d-9be4173886fe}", "description": "ignored", "type": "storage", "data": {"EnableBrowserDataCollection": true}}

  2. Create the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Mozilla\ManagedStorage\{2e53b2d2-1bdf-446a-8f9d-9be4173886fe}
  3. Set the key’s default value to the full path of the JSON file from step one, e.g. C:\ProgramFiles\vast limits\uberAgent\uAFirefoxSettings.json

If you do not set EnableBrowserDataCollection to true before upgrading to or installing version 2.6+ of uberAgent’s Firefox extension users have to opt-in at first run. If they do not opt-in, uberAgent cannot collect any website metrics.

Future versions of uberAgent (> 5.3) will set EnableBrowserDataCollection to true automatically unless this is specifically disabled in uberAgent’s configuration.

Note that setting ShowConsentDialog to false has the same effect as setting EnableBrowserDataCollection to true.

Installing the Firefox Browser Extension
July 9, 2024
Contributed by: 
C
July 9, 2024
Contributed by: 
C

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