JDK-6796470 : Use new NPAPI entry points for cookie, proxy and browser authenticator access
  • Type: Enhancement
  • Component: deploy
  • Sub-Component: plugin
  • Affected Version: 6u14
  • Priority: P2
  • Status: Resolved
  • Resolution: Fixed
  • OS: generic
  • CPU: generic
  • Submitted: 2009-01-21
  • Updated: 2010-09-08
  • Resolved: 2009-02-18
The Version table provides details related to the release that this issue/RFE will be addressed.

Unresolved : Release in which this issue/RFE will be addressed.
Resolved: Release in which this issue/RFE has been resolved.
Fixed : Release in which this issue/RFE has been fixed. The release containing this fix may be available for download as an Early Access Release or a General Availability Release.

To download the current JDK release, click here.
JDK 6 JDK 7
6u14 b02Fixed 7Fixed
Description
On non-Firefox but NPAPI-capable browsers such as Safari, Chrome and Opera, there is currently no way to interact with the browser's cookie, proxy and authenticator support because there are no entry points defined in the NPAPI to access this functionality. Currently even the new Java Plug-In uses XPCOM APIs private to Firefox for this purpose.

Thanks to collaboration with Mozilla, new NPAPI entry points have just been added to be able to get and set cookies, query the browser's proxy settings, and look up authentication information. These entry points will be available starting in Firefox 3.1 and it is expected they will quickly be ported to other web browsers. The Java Plug-In needs to be updated to take advantage of them once they are available.
Comments
SUGGESTED FIX webrev: http://sa.sfbay.sun.com/projects/deployment_data/6u14/6796470.0 testcase: http://j2se.east.sun.com/deployment/www/tests/1.6.0_14/6796470/
30-01-2009
EVALUATION The new Java Plug-in for Firefox is mostly an NPAPI plugin, meaning that it runs not only in the Firefox browser but in any browser supporting the standard NPAPI plugin interfaces. However, until now the plugin has relied on Firefox-specific XPCOM functionality in order to get access to the browser's cookie, proxy and authentication information. Mozilla has just added entry points to the NPAPI, which will ship for the first time in Firefox 3.1, to access this functionality in a browser-independent fashion. This webrev updates the native code for the Java Plug-In to take advantage of these entry points when they are available. The previous XPCOM code remains as a fallback for compatibility with Firefox 3.0.x. In order to take advantage of these entry points, the plugin2_mozilla_headers needed to be updated. Mozilla has significantly cleaned up these headers since our initial snapshot was taken and the new snapshot is much smaller and requires almost no modifications to work in our build system. Unfortunately, due to certain data type differences and cleanups that occurred on the Mozilla side, the new headers are not compatible with the previous Java Plug-In's code. This means that starting with 6u14 build 02, the new Java Plug-In requires an upgrade of the plugin2_mozilla_headers which will not compile with the source code for 6u10 through 6u14 build 01. ALT_MOZILLA_HEADERS_PATH can be set to a directory containing a snapshot of /java/devtools/share/plugin/ (subdirectories needed are plugin2_mozilla_headers and either mozilla_headers_18 or mozilla_headers_18.win32) in a build script to work around this issue. The new headers are currently located in /java/devtools/share/plugin/plugin2_mozilla_headers.tar.gz . They have not yet been unpacked to that directory, but will be upon integration of 6u14 build 02. A certain amount of code refactoring was needed in order to move the associated methods on to the Plugin instance from the various Service classes, in order to have access to the browser's plugin instance pointer (NPP) to make the native method calls. Cookie and browser authenticator lookups were refactored cleanly, but the code associated with proxy lookups is very complicated so a partial solution was taken involving continuing to use a Mozilla-specific browser service and thread-local storage to obtain the current plugin instance. These changes have been tested on the following platforms. Manual verification has been performed to ensure that the new code paths are being taken in Firefox 3.1 and that they are working correctly. Windows: IE 7, Firefox 3.0, Firefox 3.1 Solaris/x86: Firefox 3.0 Linux/x86: Firefox 3.0, Firefox 3.1
30-01-2009