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I'm a web developer responsible for an intranet. I develop using Firefox, but the IT guys here plan to use only Internet Explorer on the network going forwards.

This is because IE can be installed / configured from an MSI file, but Firefox doesn't provide an MSI. According to the admins, this means that remote administration of Firefox (e.g. managing updates, configuring NTLM authentication) is much harder.

From a developer's point of view, Firefox is a far superior browser, so if we were to use any browser as the company's default, I'd rather it was Firefox.

Tool me up! In the absence of an MSI file, what options are there for remote administration of Firefox? Are the same things possible, but done differently? Or do my admins have a point?

Speak slowly! I'm only a developer...

David
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3 Answers3

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No doubt that it's a better browser to use and to develop for from me, but that's only a small part of what makes a good platform in the workplace. Your admins don't so much have "a" point as they do a whole zoo full of points and a large family group of baby little pointlings all waiting to grow up into points themselves.

We discussed Firefox's suitability here in the past as it happens, and the long and the short of it is that while there are a few things you can do with it, it's not suited to enterprise deployment and management in many ways, making the cost of deploying it and managing on Windows desktops it much higher than that of deploying IE, and the attitudes of the Firefox developers seem to range from total disinterest in making the product more "enterprise friendly" to active hostility towards the idea.

Community
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Rob Moir
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There is a project that provides MSI files of Firefox:

Firefox MSI Packages

However, you can achieve near the same result with group policy and startup scripts. You can assign a script to each PC as a startup script that will install/upgrade Firefox (or any non-MSI package for that matter). When it reboots, it runs the script and installs it. Typically you would want to check the version on firefox.exe to see if it needs upgraded and if not move on without installing again. You can even make a computer group and assign the script to the group to do a targeted deployment. It does lack the management of AD deployed software, but you can work around most of it. For example, if you wanted to remove Firefox later, you would use the same method to publish a script that would uninstall it.

Example of how to install silently in a script:

Set Installation = WshShell.Exec("\\server\share\firefox-installer.exe /S /INI=""\\server\share\customizations.ini""")

Do While Installation.Status = 0
    WScript.Sleep 5000
Loop

When installing, you will want to use any switches to make it silent since there won't be a user there to interact with it. As far as managing the customizations, you have the option of making custom group policy templates. There are also several resources available online that already have a few of these:

Firefox ADM

Additionally you can use a custom ini when installing to set defaults. This is the method I use personally. I like to let users choose when possible. They aren't going to be likely to change anything that is required for functionality (your authentication/proxy settings for example) so it's generally safe to trust them.

Installer:Command Line Arguments

sinping
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The admins do have a point regarding manageability, although I don't see how the lack of an msi file for Firefox has anything to do with configuring it's authentication methods. That being said there are a number of application packaging tools available that can wrap the Firefox installer in an msi and provide for highly customized installs.

http://www.windowsnetworking.com/articles_tutorials/MSI-Packaging-Tools.html

joeqwerty
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