Douglas Crockford's JSMin considered by add-on reviewers as not acceptable minification tool. WAT?

Add-ons addons.mozilla.org
#1

I have used Douglas Crockford’s JSMin to minify some source code in my extension, and it has been rejected(twice) with the following reason:

Running an .exe program to minify your code is not acceptable for us. You’re free to use an open source web based tool, if you don’t want to create a build script of your own.

My objection that in the documentation there is no any restrictions to use “.exe program”, but there is an explicit prohibition of web-based tools usage, has not been taken into account.

JSMin is an old well-known, and open source tool(yes, you need to compile it, if you want).

Therefore, documentation should be updated or the extension package should be accepted.

AMO_Rejection_Review_History
AMO_Rejection_Review_History1004×1957 107 KB

#2

From my experience, the reviewers are running Linux, probably also in some virtual machine so you can imagine running “exe” file is not exactly possible.

I would guess the reasoning here is strictly pragmatic, since everybody is using Webpack / Rollup / Parcel to bundle addons, they probably have their infrastructure built to support these.

#3

Yes, I suspecting it too.

But suspecting and guessing is a wrong way when a pragmatic one is to follow the guideline.

Not everybody use Webpack / Rollup / Parcel or Linux to bundle add-ons.

If a reviewer can not or do not want to reproduce build, he should pass it to someone who will do it, or update the guideline beforehand.

#4

Sure, in an ideal world :slight_smile:. But here you are dealing with some lazy developer :smiley: like you and me.
If I were a reviewer and someone tells me to run this “exe” file to build his addon, I would be super cautious because either he is trying to hack into my Windows, or he is trying to sneak in the build some obfuscated malicious code, or he is some student experimenting with things he doesn’t understand instead of using “normal” tools, or he is way to expert/corner case.

And sadly, Mozilla is not so big organization, they are struggling on all fronts, they don’t have enough resources to handle corner cases or power users :frowning:.

In the beginning I had these issues as well, I had to change my build script several times to make it “reviewer friendly” and make it working in Linux environment.

In any case, why even use non-standard minifier? I doubt it will help performance much since addons are loaded from drive, so few saved KB makes no difference.

#5

But we are aiming for perfection. No? :slightly_smiling_face:

Then sandbox should be used. This is a common approach, anyway.

Mozilla is a pretty big organization(non-profit with ~450 mln. $ revenue), so not to waste your, my, and other power users time.

I have no problem with the same extension in Chrome Store.

Minifier can protect your solution, at least somehow: removes comments, shortens variable names.