GitHub Container Auto Switcher

Github Container Auto Switcher

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The GitHub Container Auto Switcher is a Firefox add-on designed to ease the use of Firefox Containers with GitHub for privacy-conscious users. It is intended for those GitHub users who prefer to browse public repositories while being logged out to prevent GitHub from tracking their visits.

When accessing a private repository while logged out, GitHub returns a 404 Not Found error. The above said users then have to switch the current tab to a designated GitHub container manually or using an add-on such as Switch Container. This add-on automates this switching if it detects that the private repository is accessible to the logged-in user in the designated GitHub container.

Usage

Step 1: Enable Firefox Containers and create a designated container for GitHub at Firefox Settings -> General

Step 2: Logout of GitHub

Step 3: Create a new tab in the designated container and login to GitHub in this container tab

Step 4: Find the add-on in the add-ons list and click on it. Select your designated Firefox container for GitHub.

Step 5: Create a GitHub Personal Access Token with "repo" scope. Ref: GitHub's official documentation.

Step 6: Paste the obtained token (the one that is prefixed with ghp_) in the addon and click "SAVE".

Step 7: Test the add-on by attempting to browse to a private repository in a non-containerized tab. The add-on should detect the repository being private and should switch the current tab to the designated GitHub container.

Features

• Automatic Container Switching: This add-on activates exclusively on GitHub pages (github.com/*). If you encounter a 404 error on a GitHub page, it parses the repository by extracting the owner/repo name from the URL, even if you're on a subpage like issues or pull requests.

• Private Repository Detection: Using GitHub API, the add-on fetches the repository's metadata and checks if the repository is private. If so, it automatically switches your tab to the designated GitHub container.

• Privacy Preserving: Apart from the request to the GitHub API, no data leaves your device. The designated GitHub container ID and Personal Access Token are stored locally in the addon's local storage.

What's New

• Version 0.0.1 -- Added private repository detection and automatic switching to designated GitHub container

Sources

This add-on was built based on the following sources:

• Forked off the Switch Container Add-on

• Contextual identities handling:

  https://github.com/mdn/webextensions-examples/blob/master/contextual-identities/context.js

• Pop-up html/css:

  https://github.com/mdn/webextensions-examples/blob/master/contextual-identities/context.html (html)

  https://github.com/mdn/webextensions-examples/blob/master/contextual-identities/context.css (css)

• Icon:

  omni.ja\chrome\browser\content\browser\

Legal

Disclaimer: This add-on is open source and is not endorsed by Mozilla, MDN, or GitHub, and has no commercial objectives.

This project is licensed under the terms of the Mozilla Public License Version 2.0.