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https://github.com/alhadis/mozilla-profile-tools

Wrapper for building CLI utilities with niche functions related to Mozilla profile directory management.
https://github.com/alhadis/mozilla-profile-tools

firefox firefox-profile firefox-profiles lz4 mozilla mozlz4 user-profile user-profiles

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Wrapper for building CLI utilities with niche functions related to Mozilla profile directory management.

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README 

        
Mozilla profile tools

================================================================================

This repository contains build instructions for two *extremely* niche utilities:



* [`mozinstallhash`]: A program to compute the hash used in Mozilla installation

  profile names. These form part of the unique identifier strings that represent

  a user profile directory (e.g., in `~/Application Support/Firefox/Profiles/`).

  [^1]‍[^2]



* [`mozlz4`]: A program to compress and decompress files using Mozilla's variant

  of the [LZ4 algorithm](https://w.wiki/AeWU). This is used by (recent) releases

  of Firefox to compress certain JSON files in user profile directories.



Both of these tools reference poorly-documented facilities in Mozilla's codebase

that are of interest to those who programmatically manipulate their user profile

directories outside of Firefox.



Usage

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Building these tools requires [Go] (v1.15 or newer) and [Rust] (v1.61 or newer).

To build and install them, run:



~~~console

$ make all

$ make install                          # Default install locations

$ make bindir=/path/to/dir install      # Specify location of installed binaries

~~~



The `make install` step is optional and requires a BSD-style [`install(1)`][] to

be available on the user's system. Users can "install" the binaries simply using

[`mv(1)`][]; no other files are required to run the programs once they're built.



Mirrors

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

In the event that an upstream repository "disappears", a copy of its source code

(possibly outdated) can be found in a detached branch of this repository. To use

these backups, modifications to the source code may be required (details of such

changes are beyond the scope of this document).



[^1]: https://github.com/twpayne/chezmoi/issues/1226#issuecomment-867228095 \

      A well-researched overview of Mozilla's use of hashing to generate profile

      ID strings. Courtesy of [**@bradenhilton**], who also authored the Go code

      used by this repository (with minor modifications).



[^2]: https://bit.ly/41NXOC7 \

      Shortlink to `toolkit/mozapps/update/common/commonupdatedir.cpp` (revision

      2fcb225) in the online code browser for the `mozilla-central`

      repository.



[**@bradenhilton**]: https://github.com/bradenhilton

[`mozinstallhash`]:  https://github.com/bradenhilton/mozillainstallhash

[`mozlz4`]:          https://github.com/jusw85/mozlz4

[`mv(1)`]:           https://man.openbsd.org/mv.1

[`install(1)`]:      https://man.openbsd.org/install.1

[Rust]:              https://www.rust-lang.org/tools/install

[Go]:                https://go.dev/dl/