Flash Plugin for Firefox Portable 0.1 (Functional Test Release)

Submitted by John T. Haller on September 6, 2008 - 12:40am

I've put together a functional test of some code I'm working on to automatically download and install the flash plugin for Firefox Portable. It's simple yet seems to work quite well even with many proxies as long as they are properly defined in IE/Windows and doesn't leave anything behind.

When run, it'll download the plugin from Adobe's server and install it into your copy of Firefox. You just select your FirefoxPortable directory in the installer and it does the rest. Please give it a try and let me know if it works for you. If not, please provide details (your OS, directory installed to, error message received, etc).

Download Flash Plugin for Firefox Portable 0.1 [120KB download / 2.8MB installed]
MD5: ded948227cac3e8825a53c663747303b

PORTABILITY NOTE: Adobe Flash is not portable and will store Local Shared Objects (aka Flash Cookies) on every PC you visit. Firefox does not have access to these and they are not deleted when you delete private data though you can use the Objection extension to view them.

( categories:

Beta Testing

)

It may be a while...

TStodden (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 1:18am

While I thank you for making this installer... I've already done the runaround to add Flash support to Firefox Portable. However, most users are either too lazy (or don't know how) to install Flash manually, so this'll like be a godsend for them.

When Adobe releases an updated version, I'll definitely give this a spin.

~TStodden
Game Monkey Likes You!

Thanks man, this is usefull.

LOGAN-Portable (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 4:17am

Thanks man, this is usefull. Maybe also usefull for other plugins one day, who knows.

About Shared Objects, isn't there a way to copy SO's which have a high chance of heing created during your session be be backed up on USB? Maybe through time/date or something? Or if portable version runs backup old and have exclusive FFP folder as long as it runs.

Problem is that the SO's are used across all browsers thus might be hard to keep isolated. And you could end up taking SO's with you from other possible Browser or application sessions. So it's probably very hard to impossible to do.

Anyway thanks for a great additional tool and hopefully it will be included in FPP installer in the future.

Separate

John T. Haller (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 11:02am

It will be a separate download because we need to warn users that flash isn't portable before installing. I've been debating adding LSO support... or partial support... to the FFP launcher, but it could get messy.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

how about maybe moving the

TaffinFoxcroft (Homepage) - September 7, 2008 - 5:29am

how about maybe moving the local LSOs to a temp directory, let firefox do its work, moving firefox's LSOs to the drive, then finally move the local LSOs back?

Dogbottler says: Don't count your dogs until they're bottled.

Nice.

Kevin Porter (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 9:05am

Works well, and it's really convenient. Thanks, John.

I agree with TStodden, this is really good for users who don't know how to install Flash for Firefox Portable, or they are too lazy.

"Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning." - Rick Cook

Ok, I'm confused...

BuddhaChu - September 6, 2008 - 10:32am

Ok, I'm confused...

If I extract the PortableFirefox 3.0.1 file into a new directory (start with a fresh setup) and go to a Flash enabled website with it, the Flash displays fine. What exactly is this little program supposed to do for me over and above what's already in the PFF 3.0.1 file? (Yes, I read the description above...but PFF already runs Flash fine without running this little downloaded thing...hence my confusion)

Cancer Survivors -- Remember the fight, celebrate the victory!
Help control the rugrat population -- have yourself spayed or neutered!

Varies By PC

John T. Haller (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 10:59am

That PC already has flash on it then. If the PC you're on already has flash, FFP will use the local copy. If it doesn't, it won't display flash at all.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

I think

Simeon - September 6, 2008 - 11:02am

Firefox checks the loca install for flash. So if you have flash installed for your local Firefox, it works with the portable even if you don't use Johns installer. To really test it you have to visit Tim () or find another flash-less PC.

EDIT: Oh John was fast!

"What about Love?" - "Overrated. Biochemically no different than eating large quantities of chocolate." - Al Pacino in The Devils Advocate

Thanks guys. I didn't know

BuddhaChu - September 6, 2008 - 7:15pm

Thanks guys. I didn't know Firefox used Flash from the host system if present. Makes sense now.

Cancer Survivors -- Remember the fight, celebrate the victory!
Help control the rugrat population -- have yourself spayed or neutered!

BUG: (I don't know if this is

BuddhaChu - September 6, 2008 - 10:47am

BUG: (I don't know if this is "fixable" as it may be just how the file tree menu works)

Run your PortableFirefox 3.0.1 file and have it install to the root of your hard drive. I used D:\Firefox2 (this was for testing as mentioned in the post above)

Now run the Flash Plugin Downloader test program. When the menu comes up for me, it prompts me to select the D:\PortableApps\FirefoxPortable directory where my "normal" install lives. I use the "Browse" button to select the test directory D:\Firefox2 and the installer insists on appending FirefoxPortable on the end so the target path becomes D:\FirefoxPortable2\FirefoxPortable which doesn't exist. I have to manually delete the \FirefoxPortable part and then hit the "Install" button.

Yes, this is easy to work around, but I'm thinking of making this downloader more user friendly for the computer inept here. As stated above, I'm not sure if this can be fixed or not.

Cancer Survivors -- Remember the fight, celebrate the victory!
Help control the rugrat population -- have yourself spayed or neutered!

NSIS Bug?

John T. Haller (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 11:01am

That may be a bug in NSIS itself. It seems that all the recently recompiled installers do that (and this is based on old 0.9.9.0 code) when they're not set to. I'll look into it.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

John, it's not a bug. See

wraithdu - September 8, 2008 - 10:13am

John, it's not a bug. See the NSIS helpfile regarding InstallDir. Basically, if you don't end the InstallDir command with a "\", then whatever follows the previous "\" is automatically appended to the end of the browsed directory.

Sounds like I'm glad I'm

BuddhaChu - September 8, 2008 - 5:33pm

Sounds like I'm glad I'm actually mentioned it as this may help all the installers.

NSIS helpfile:

4.8.1.21 InstallDir

definstdir

Sets the default installation directory. See the variables section for
variables that can be used to make this string (especially $PROGRAMFILES).
Note that the part of this string following the last \ will be used if the
user selects 'browse', and may be appended back on to the string at install
time (to disable this, end the directory with a \ (which will require the
entire parameter to be enclosed with quotes). If this doesn't make any
sense, play around with the browse button a bit.

Cancer Survivors -- Remember the fight, celebrate the victory!
Help control the rugrat population -- have yourself spayed or neutered!

PROTIP

The MAZZTer (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 11:19am

Most plugins will work if you just copy your plugins folder from your local Firefox to the Data\plugins folder of FirefoxPortable. Although some plugins (QuickTime I think, and Java) will require local files to also be installed. Still, this means it'll work if the local user has the required programs installed. Of course I believe some plugins like Adobe Reader don't like it if the local version doesn't exactly match the plugin version (but hey, what can you do?).

Some other plugins will hide in other folders. Sometimes they are single files that you can copy to Data\plugins anyway. Sometimes they are a plugin with dependency DLLs so they're in a separate folder to keep things tidy. You can try copying these too. Sometimes they'll work, sometimes not. Experiment. You probably need to use a different computer (or a virtual machine) to fully see if something will work or not.

"But MAZZ," you say to me, "how do I find these hiding plugins?!?"

I'm glad you asked.

In your local Firefox, open the url about:config and skip the warning screen (as long as you just do as I say you'll be OK). put "plugin" in the filter and look for the plugin.expose_full_path value. If it's set to false double click it to set it to true. If you can't find it, right click > New > Boolean and call it plugin.expose_full_path and set it to true. Then you can go to the url about:plugins and you'll see the full path of any plugin, so you can check it out in explorer.

This also helps if you want to selectively import plugins instead of importing all at once (EX you probably don't want to import an anti-virus plugin since it most certainly isn't going to work on any other computers).

My Google Chrome wrapper/launcher has been featured on the PortableApps.com front page! ~~HIRE ME~~ I HAVE BEEN HIRED.

Not all plugins came over

Miles - January 23, 2009 - 7:44pm

After installing John's portable flash, copied the plugins from C drive to I/portableapps/app/firefox/plugins and see several are listed as drive I (thumb drive). However, many are still listed as C in about:plugins (although I haven't restarted) --

flash (marcromedia) npswf32.dll
itunes npitunes.dll
silverlight npctrl.dll
google upater 2.2.969.23408 & npcldetect11.dll & npgoogleonecheck7.dll
java platform SE6 VII
msft drm npdrmv2.dll & npwmsdrm.dll

Does that mean that all of those need again downloading and installation?
Miles

Off Topic

John T. Haller (Homepage) - January 23, 2009 - 7:59pm

This is off topic. Most "plugins" are just connectors to local software and can not be made portable. If you wish to discuss further please post a new topic. This is for discussion of the flash installer only.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Location ?

Tim Clark - September 6, 2008 - 12:14pm

John, I will download and test this on monday.
Quick question, will the default location be :

...\FirefoxPortable\Data\plugins
or
...\FirefoxPortable\App\firefox\plugins

Tim

Things have got to get better, they can't get worse, or can they?

\FirefoxPortable\App\firefox\plugins

John T. Haller (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 12:29pm

\FirefoxPortable\App\firefox\plugins which is the one officially supported by Mozilla.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Ummm....

J Neutron - September 11, 2009 - 5:33pm

Correct me if I am wrong, but:

1. user-data is supposed to live in the \Data subdirectory, not the \App subdirectory. That way, it gets backed up by your PAM's backup thingie and since new upgrades don't touch the \Data fork at all, user-data is always preserved during the process.

2. The \Data\plugins subdirectory has a plugin_readme.txt file that says:

Place Firefox plugins in this directory (Flash, Shockwave, etc)

3. Finally, according to about:plugins in FirefoxPortable, both locations (and the local machine) are loaded. I was rather surprised to find that the one this test release downloaded was newer than the one I already had installed in FirefoxPortable and that one was newer than the local machine, so about:plugins saw and reported THREE versions of the Flash plugin.

neutron1132 (at) usa (dot) com

is this code the one i used?

powerjuce - September 6, 2008 - 12:39pm

to download the files for reshaker and babywebserver?

~powerjuce

Please search before posting. ~Thanks

Nope

John T. Haller (Homepage) - September 6, 2008 - 1:20pm

I wrote this myself.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Cool

Simeon - September 23, 2008 - 9:11am

I just came across a PC without Flash and wanted to check gallup.com which has flash for its charts. So I installed this plugin and it worked b-e-a-utifully.

Thanks John for this handy thing.

PS. is there a sourcecode somewhere?

"What about Love?" - "Overrated. Biochemically no different than eating large quantities of chocolate." - Al Pacino in The Devils Advocate

flash player

Miles - January 23, 2009 - 7:07pm

It went so easily and quickly I didn't even know it was completed until I checked the folder firefoxportable/firefox/plugins and there it was!

Now I have to figure out how to get the other plugins into the folder, of which there are many. Hopefully I won't need to download all of them again! Perhaps a simple matter of copying from the folder in C to the same plugin folder in portable?

Source.

Ryan McCue (Homepage) - January 23, 2009 - 8:19pm

Under the self-promotion guidelines, you must post source code for this.
"The code for this product must be available from the page you link to in your post"

So, pony up. No one is exempt.

"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."

thank you also...

zoester - March 19, 2009 - 12:21pm

Thanks for the simple upload and installer. I appreciate the simplicity. While I have some knowledge, the workaround was just not working for me and this was very simple.

Thanks for making my workday more entertaining!

Best....

Error message while installing

SofiaAgapao - May 24, 2009 - 11:40am

I was able to download the file, but when I try to install it to my flash drive, I get this error:

ERROR: HTTP/1.1 407 Proxy Authentication Required ( The ISA Server requires authentication to fulfill the request. Access to the Web Proxy service is denied. )

Help!

Flash and shockwave plug in installin

Wolfstarr - June 25, 2009 - 2:16pm

To Sofia

I was having trouble installing the latest plugins for flash and shockwave.
I tried the quickie way of downloading and then installing and got the same msg you did. I finally got it to work by 1 getting a friend of mine to fwd me the 3 files I needed ( Flashplayer.xpt, NPSWF32.dll & NPSWF32_FlashUtil.exe) and ADDED them to
FirefoxPortable\Data\plugins directory and voila it worked...

Hope this helps.

does this need updating?

consul (Homepage) - June 15, 2009 - 2:02pm

I needed a current version to the flash so I tried installing it again.

I tried 3 methods of installing flash, first was using adobe's installer directly to the FirefoxPortable folder. Installed fine, but I still got the message. Then I tried copying the file directly into the plugin directory (I tried both of them) and that worked easily but still didn't work. Even tried this plugin, which installed fine with no error message, but this also didn't work.

This extension did work for me last year when I used it.

WinXP fully updated. When I manually copied the files over, I tried first FirefoxPortable\App\Firefox\Plugins and then FirefoxPortable\Data\plugins

Don't be an uberPr∅. They are stinky.

Here's how to update

lwc - July 12, 2009 - 6:29am

Until the author of this plugin comes back from the dead, here's how to update the plugin (that is, only its NPSWF32.dll file which is the actual flash):

http://my.opera.com/Tamil/blog/how-to-install-flash-player

It works fine for me (on ffp

Pyromaniac (Homepage) - July 5, 2009 - 6:00pm

It works fine for me (on ffp 3.5)

I type this to you from Minefield, Portable Edition.

to clear LSO's try the

nuts32605 - July 7, 2009 - 11:30am

to clear LSO's try the BetterPrivacy addon for firefox. It works well for me.

flash player not installing

runemas3 - August 23, 2009 - 9:04pm

hello I downloaded this file to my flashdrive under the firefox portable app. I ran the file set the installation to the same folder and nothing happens.... help?

That's probably because the

The MAZZTer (Homepage) - August 24, 2009 - 1:13am

That's probably because the installer is one year out of date. The installer uses a hard-coded download location which is probably no longer valid. In addition Firefox Portable and the PortableApps.com Platform have both received updates since then which may be causing compatibility problems.

Try this to get flash on your Firefox Portable:

- Using a non-IE browser (it's important not to use IE so you install the correct version of Flash. You can use Firefox Portable itself if you do not have any other browser available) go to Adobe's Flash website and make sure you have the latest version of flash, and install it if necessary.
- Open the folder C:\WINDOWS\system32\Macromed\Flash.
- Open the Folder X:\PortableApps\FirefoxPortable\App\Firefox\plugins in another window, where X is replaced with your portable drive letter. Create the plugins folder if it does not exist.
- Copy the following files from Flash to plugins: NPSWF32.dll NPSWF32_FlashUtil.exe flashplayer.xpt
- You can repeat this process any time to upgrade Flash for Firefox Portable on your portable device.

My Google Chrome wrapper/launcher has been featured on the PortableApps.com front page! ~~HIRE ME~~ I HAVE BEEN HIRED.

The

NathanJ79 (Homepage) - August 24, 2009 - 2:01am

The MAZZterNPSWF32_FlashUtil.exe

What's this one do? I have the other two, but not the .exe, and Flash stuff loads fine for me. At least YouTube, wunderground.com's live weather map, and my local NBC affiliate's videos. Don't really go to other Flash-powered sites.

Slightly better way involves migrating to Portable Firefox from a locally-installed Firefox. Just find the local plugins folder, and copy it to the portable one. I have Acrobat, AIR, Flash, Shockwave, Quicktime, and a bunch of other plugins I had on my installed Firefox. IE's been the default browser on my computer for most of this year now - I've been using Portable Firefox, even at home. So I don't think I've ever had that .exe.

'̿'\̵͇̿̿\з=(•̪●)=ε/̵͇̿̿/'̿'̿ ̿

It appears to be the updater

The MAZZTer (Homepage) - August 26, 2009 - 10:58pm

It appears to be the updater tool (run it and see).

I guess it wouldn't be needed for a portable installation, then.

My Google Chrome wrapper/launcher has been featured on the PortableApps.com front page! ~~HIRE ME~~ I HAVE BEEN HIRED.

Works

John T. Haller (Homepage) - August 24, 2009 - 9:31am

I just tried it and it downloaded and installed 10.0.32.18, which is the current version. Maybe it doesn't do upgrades of it. I'll look at it later today.

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

Perhaps he had Firefox

The MAZZTer (Homepage) - August 26, 2009 - 10:59pm

Perhaps he had Firefox running with the Flash plugin DLL loaded and running? That would certainly mess it up. The installer should check for a running Firefox Portable if it doesn't already.

My Google Chrome wrapper/launcher has been featured on the PortableApps.com front page! ~~HIRE ME~~ I HAVE BEEN HIRED.

Good Point

John T. Haller (Homepage) - August 26, 2009 - 11:54pm

I need to update this to use the current installer rather than the old custom one I did anyway. And add one for Chrome

Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!

WHAT A GODSEND THANK YOU!!!

mmd123 (Homepage) - September 3, 2009 - 7:47pm

THIS IS A GOD SEND FOR ME...AS I HAVE WINDOWS VISTA, AND AM RESTRICTED, SO I CANT UPDATE FLASH PLAYER, YOU MY GOOD FRIEND HAVE SAVED ME FROM IE8, SO THANK YOU SO MUCH...YOU SIR, ARE A HERO TO ME...

*now to just copy over updated ff to hdd and i ish set, again...*

TY SO MUCH
10/10

please and thank you...
MMD123

Local Shared Objects

srfox23 - September 11, 2009 - 4:32pm

There is a plugin for Firefox that erases the LSO cookies called BetterPrivacy. This works after the browser closes so you don't leave any flash cookies behind.

Steve F

Nope

Pyromaniac (Homepage) - September 13, 2009 - 7:28pm

I tried it out. It worked fine the first time I used it. I switched computers and then firefox didn't recognize the flash plugin. So I thought it might be the addon so I disabled it... still wouldn't let flash work. So I uninstalled it and only then did flash work again. I don't know why this happened (since its not supposed to disable flash) but I guess it somehow did.

I type this to you from Minefield, Portable Edition.

Update?

horusofoz - October 28, 2009 - 6:54am

Hi John

Is it possible for this to be updated?I just ran it now and according to the Firefox Plugin Check page it isn't getting the latest version of flash.

Thanks

EDIT: Can I again further this request with the added note that an outdated version of flash is a serious security vulnerability. Therefore FFP users with this flash plugin are currently at risk

Live to learn. Learn to live. - JWSII

Well on the FF update page

getco - October 31, 2009 - 5:20pm

Well on the FF update page (http://en-us.www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/3.5.4/whatsnew/) it says my Adobe Flash Plug-in is outdated, but on the page it points to - http://get.adobe.com/flashplayer/ it says the latest version of the plugin is 10.0.32.18 which when I go to my plugins list is the same version, so it seems I do have the latest version obtained from John's installer - but for some reason it doesn't detect it?

Can someone please explain this?

Thanks!

Just bumping it in hopes that

getco - November 5, 2009 - 6:55am

Just bumping it in hopes that maybe someone will be able to provide some help...

it worked.

OliverK (Homepage) - November 5, 2009 - 9:33pm

it worked. If you have a local install it detects those plugins. Maybe the local install is outdated?

Too many lonely hearts in the real world
Too many bridges you can burn
Too many tables you can't turn
Don't wanna live my life in the real world

download flash and search for

Pyromaniac (Homepage) - November 5, 2009 - 9:03pm

download flash and search for it. I got that message too but I copied a local install and I stopped getting that message

I type this to you from Minefield, Portable Edition.

its quite simple

ede875 - October 29, 2009 - 8:37am

just unpack the install_flash_player.exe with an extractor (as universal extractor) and copy&paste the npnul32.dll and the NPSWF32.dll to "...\PortableApps\FirefoxPortable\App\Firefox\plugins" - et voilá!

in that particular folder the file flashplayer.xpt should be contained.

Tried that - there was no

getco - October 31, 2009 - 5:35pm

Tried that - there was no npnul32.dll in the exe file. The NPSWF32.dll was the same as the one John's updater downloaded... I have no idea why it would not work.

Installer is broken

Flanjygo - February 17, 2010 - 12:58pm

When I used the installer, Flash stopped working completely. It wouldn't even load the local copy. But I just extracted it this way and it works perfectly. I'm not sure what I did wrong with the installer but it didn't work.

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Flash Plugin for Firefox Portable 0.1 (Functional Test Release)