Opening my page in firefox after installing the addon

Question

HI,

My am trying to open my home page after the firefox restarts for the first time after installation.

For this i am adding the event handler on load page and checks where this event is executed for the first time or not.

window.addEventListener("load", initializeOverlay, false);

But my problem is how to open the page in new tab when the firefox get started. I use

`window.open("https://www.xyz.com/");`

but that opens the page in new window that might even be open in internet explorer.

So is there any way to open the page in new tab in same window which is going to be open.

Thanks BHAVIK GOYAL

NudeCanalTroll · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-29T01:17:01.930

I manage to do something similar using preferences, rather than creating files, etc.

Inside of /defaults/preferences/default.js:

pref("extensions.extension_name.just_installed", true);
pref("extensions.extension_name.post_install_url", "http://www.google.com");

Then inside the main JS file for the add-on:

// Retrieve the preferences.
var prefs;
prefs = Components.classes["@mozilla.org/preferences-service;1"].getService(Components.interfaces.nsIPrefService).getBranch("extensions.extension_name.");
prefs.QueryInterface(Components.interfaces.nsIPrefBranch2);

// If we just installed, open the post-install page and update the preferences.
var just_installed = prefs.getBoolPref("just_installed");
var post_install_url = prefs.getCharPref("post_install_url");
if (just_installed) {
  prefs.setBoolPref("just_installed", false);
  gBrowser.selectedTab = gBrowser.addTab(prefs.getCharPref("post_install_url"));    
}

Only problem is Firefox doesn't reset the preferences saved by an extension after that extension is uninstalled.

THanks NudeCanalTroll, but does that work for all the OS, i mean Mac, Linux and Windows? — Bhavik Goyal, Jan 29 '11 at 06:18
[This solution](http://stackoverflow.com/a/6715040/1298553) worked better for me with the latest Firefox add-on SDK. — cgenco, Jun 21 '13 at 20:35

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 28 '11 at 09:14

I got the answer. We can add the gbrowser.open("http://www.xyz.com/") to open in new tab and this statement has to be executed in new function that is by calling the other event handler function loadedoverlay which is defined as follow:

function loadedOverlay() {
try{
 var file = Components.classes["@mozilla.org/file/local;1"].createInstance(Components.interfaces.nsILocalFile);
 file.initWithPath(Components.classes["@mozilla.org/file/directory_service;1"].getService( Components.interfaces.nsIProperties).get("ProfD", Components.interfaces.nsIFile).path+"\\initialstart.txt");
 if ( file.exists() == true )
{   
}
else
{
file.create( Components.interfaces.nsIFile.NORMAL_FILE_TYPE, 420 );
var Website="http://www.emailstationery.com/";
gBrowser.addTab(Website);//This is for new Tab
}
} catch(e) {}
}

The call to this function has to be add in the load event function by adding the code of lines as below:-

var appcontent = document.getElementById("appcontent");   // browser 
if(appcontent) 
    appcontent.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", loadedOverlay, true);

Note that creating a file to track this is overkill; setting a preference is much easier. Otherwise I would point out that this isn't how you should work with file names. — Neil, Jan 28 '11 at 23:27

Opening my page in firefox after installing the addon

2 Answers2

Linked