Summary
First we added apt: support to Firefox, making software installation easier. This spec proposes to add a "run:" handler to launch software from a web page.
Rationale
Useful and dangerous.
Running sofware with a single click could be dangerous, but a wide range of possibilities come to scene:
- Web (wiki) recipes with automatic links to required tools
- User manual with links to (python?) assistants
- Support Team mails with links to scripts.
In order to make this runnable urls as safe as possible, whitelists or a secure directory with links to allowed apps could be the solution.
User stories
An user is reading a Ubuntu forum with some kind of recipe about configuring fonts, but he/she doesn't know how to launch font-config-dialog. Another user post a link "run:fontconfig-voodoo" so the first one just need to click on it.
An html manual could include a link to run an assistant for network configuration right from its pages.
I want to design a nice & simple desktop for my parents with only a few big icons, but I have no programming skills. However, I can set a local html page up with launchers for them.
Authoring tools like Ubuntu Tweaks would be really easy with little knowledge about gtk interface.
Design
URls beggining with "run:" should trigger (in Firefox at least) a wrapper application (/usr/bin/run-url) to control execution permissions.
"run-url" will parse and check the second part (program name) of the URL. If this program is part of a distribution package, execution is granted with no more dialogs.
A simple 'dpkg -S' will do the job.
Implementation
- A package with Firefox tweaks (similar to apturl) is needed, although anyone can test the launcher script tweaking the about:config page or including a run-url.js file in /etc/firefox-x/ containing these lines:
pref("network.protocol-handler.app.run","/usr/bin/run-url");
pref("network.protocol-handler.warn-external.run",false);
- A simple dialog to allow/disallow runnable sofware could be needed as well.
Sample test page
This wiki doesn't support run:// links, so download and save this page in order to test run-url:
My Programs
Click on program name to launch it.
| Program | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Select your favourite mirror site to download your upgrades | ||
| Calculator | Simple calculator | |
| Network Properties | Proxy and network parameters Configuration | |
| Sudoku | The most famous numbers game |
Discussion
AlfonsoDeCala: another runurl project already exists in launchpad with a different focus. That one download and execute scripts from Internet (really insecure IMHO). In order to avoid confussion, this firefox-run-url should use a different name for the plugin: "run-url" or "execurl"