Updated: Never — Philip's Blog

Christophe thinks I might have something interesting to say on this topic. I'm not exactly sure why he thinks that, however. :-)

I don't use all that much software which supports "plugins". When I need a graphical webbrowser for some reason, I like to use Mozilla Firefox. According to about:plugins, I have four plugins installed. Two of which appear to be put there by default.

• Dummy flash plugin

  Amazingly useful, this is. Many so-called "websites" these days appear to be polluted with a proprietary technology called "Flash", distributed under certain conditions to users of certain so-called "operating systems" by Adobe, formerly Macromedia. I don't believe in this technology. I do not agree with the conditions for using it. My operating system of choice (FreeBSD) is not among the systems "allowed" to use this technology.

  Unfortunately, by default, Mozilla Firefox insists I would enjoy the content of websites using this technology more if I were to agree to the conditions and download this plugin (which, as I mentioned, does not exist for my operating system of choice).

  Because rather a lot of websites seem to be getting polluted with "Flash", my browsing experience was often interrupted by this annoying, modal, completely blocking dialogue instructing me to go fetch the damned plugin or else... Until I found this amazing trick of using a "plugin" to register the MIME type used by "Flash" which places friendly white areas where the "Flash" would otherwise be rendered. Thus getting rid of the pesky dialogue.

  The plugin is in the FreeBSD ports tree, or on the author's site:

  http://www.gsoft.com.au/~doconnor/nullflash.html

• Java(TM) plugin

  This appears to be installed together with the Java Runtime Environment port. I do not believe in Java "applets", so I have disabled this plugin using the appropriate setting in Mozilla Firefox' "Preferences" box.

The other two plugins are "default plugin", which I assume is a default plugin and "demo print plugin for unix/linux", which I really don't have a clue about.

Another application I use supporting plugins is Gaim. Other than the Jabber plugin which is distributed with it by default, I use the Meanwhile plugin to communicate using the Lotus "Sametime" protocol at work. This allows me to limit my "use" (however you wish to define that) of my Microsoft "Windows" desktop machine to an absolute minimum. I really can't understand how people can live in a restricted pointy-click environment like that. I prefer to be productive instead.

I'm sure I use some other "pluginable" applications, but I don't think I consciously installed any plugins for them.

Since this appears to be a "chain blog" of sorts, I'd like to hear Grog's opinion on this matter.