No longer able to follow local file links.
In previous versions of firefox ( 28 and Earlier ) I was able to follow local file links by whitelisting them in the user preferences file as shown here: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Links_to_local_pages_do_not_work
This functionality has ceased to work with the update.
Update to information added by a forum moderator
I NoteIn order to respond to demands of enterprise users, the localfilelinks policy has been restored with Firefox 30. This allows users to follow links on a Web page (http:// or https://) to the local file system (file:///) especially on corporate internal applications. For the meantime, Firefox Beta or the caps-fileuri extension created by a Mozilla developer can be used to workaround this restriction.
mentions caps-fileuri extension but this appears to have been removed. No longer at https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/caps-fileuri/ (original may be at https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/attachment.cgi?id=8415447 )
Also note a possibly related question is currently open
- When will the local links issue be fixed? /questions/1066709
Modified by John99
Chosen solution
The "capability." prefs breaking is bug 995943.
Bobby Holley is working on an extension in that bug that would fix the issue.
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Were you using "capability." preferences? I read somewhere that Firefox 29+ no longer implements "capability." preferences. I haven't read about the reason for this.
Do any of the other workarounds still work?
I believe that's what they were, seeing as that's what listed as the solution on http://kb.mozillazine.org/Links_to_local_pages_do_not_work
If there were other work arounds, it's news to me.
I guess the only other workaround was the LocalLink extension. I've never tried it myself.
I tried it and it doesn't work either. I think the extension generated capability related settings on the fly like NoScript did.
Should I post a Bug report on this?
Chosen Solution
The "capability." prefs breaking is bug 995943.
Bobby Holley is working on an extension in that bug that would fix the issue.
You might find a similar bug already posted, but if not, sure, others are going to have the issue.
I guess one question is implementation. What mechanism is replacing capability preferences? If there isn't something that general purpose, what kind of site-level permission could be relevant?
And if the need is not clear, what are the use cases for http:// to file:// access that the developers need to consider? Or is it for file:// to file:// access that's most critical?
Georg Fritzsche provided the current open bug report on this. It looks like they are working on coming up with an extension to enable capability like functionality. It'll suck to have to point to an extension, but If it works I'll live with it.