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Chapter 2 Customizing Mozilla in Ten Minutes
This chapter shows you how to use the CCK tool to implement some of the simplest customizations—that is, those that don't require you to prepare any files beforehand.
Other customizations that you can perform with the CCK tool, such as providing your own custom bookmarks or custom animated logo, require that you create customized files before you run the tool. Later chapters describe the preparations required for those customizations.
This chapter contains these sections:
What You'll Customize
Quick Customization Instructions
Verifying Your Customizations
This chapter describers how to create a CD-based Mozilla installer for use on Windows that includes these customizations:
- Your company name displayed in these locations:
- Browser window's title bar.
- CD autorun screen, which is the screen that users see when they insert the Mozilla CD into a CD-ROM drive.
- Mozilla program folder name that appears in the Windows Start menu.
- The browser's default home page set to your own home page. The home page is the first page users see when they start Navigator and the page they see when they click the Navigator Home button.
- Mail and News server settings.
- A Mozilla installer that installs only the components you want users to have.
If these are the only customizations you need to make, your installer will be ready for packaging and distribution after you finish this chapter.
Even if you plan to make some of the additional customizations that require preparing files, it's still a good idea to follow the steps described in this chapter as a way of familiarizing yourself with the CCK Tool. Once you have prepared the additional files you need, you can run the tool again to add those customizations to the ones you make in this chapter.
Quick Customization Instructions
This section guides you through the process of running the CCK tool, which is basically the same whether you are performing the simple customizations described here or those requiring some file preparation as described in the chapters that follow.
The examples shown in this section are based on the sample configuration provided with the tool for a hypothetical ISP called MyISP. You should, of course, enter the equivalent information for your own company in each screen.
The steps that follow describe how to create a customized Mozilla installer that implements the simple customizations described in the previous section.
- Open the Start menu and choose Programs, then Mozilla Client Customization Kit, then N6CCKTool.
- Welcome to the Mozilla Client Customization Kit! On the first screen you see when you run the CCK Tool, click New Configuration, enter a name for the directory that the CCK tool will use to store your custom configuration information, and click Create New Configuration. Then click Next to continue.
- Specify Platform Information. You can choose to generate a Windows or a Linux installer. It's also possible to create a Macintosh installer by manipulating the installation files produced for a Windows installer.
- For now, leave Windows as the selected platform.
- Gathering Information. This screen specifies whether you want a CD-ready installer, the FTP address (if any) you plan to use for a network-ready installer, and the company identifier that will appear as part of the user agent string.
- Confirm that the checkbox labeled "Include CD Autorun Screen" is selected.
- Enter your company identifier in the field for that purpose near the bottom of the screen
- The company identifier you enter will be included as part of the user agent string, which helps identify the browser type each the browser accesses your web site or any other web site. Your identifier in the user agent string allows your company (or others) to track the number of times Internet web sites are accessed by web browsers that you've customized.
- The identifier you supply can be up to 10 characters in length. You must supply one.
- For example, if you enter "MyISP" in the Company Identifier field, the resulting user agent string would look like this:
- When you are ready, click Next to register the customizations you've made on this screen and proceed to the next screen.
- Customize the Mozilla Browser - Part One. This screen allows you to customize the animated logo near the upper-right corner of the Navigator window and to add a Help menu item.
- For now, you won't be performing these customizations—but you can come back and do them later if you wish. Just click Next to proceed to the next screen.
- Customize the Mozilla Browser - Part Two. This screen specifies the program folder name that appears under Start Menu/Programs, a custom read-me file, and the files to use for a custom animated logo.
- For now, just enter your company name in the Start Menu section, then click Next.
- Customize the Mozilla Browser - Part Three. This screen specifies the default home page, bookmarks file, and title bar text.
- Under Default Home Page, enter the URL for the web page that you want to assign as Navigator's default home page.
- Under Browser Window's Title Bar Text, enter your company name.
- Click Next to continue.
- Customize Mozilla Mail. This screen specifies your mail domain and server information.
If you choose to provide customized mail settings, fill in every field in the Customize Mozilla Mail screen. You must fill in all fields, otherwise no customized mail server settings will appear in your customized version of Mozilla 1.4.1.
- For short descriptions of the information to enter in each field, click the Help button. For examples of the settings that each field controls, click the corresponding Show Example buttons. Click Next when you are finished.
- Customize Mozilla News. This screen specifies your mail domain and server information.
- If you choose to provide customized news settings, fill in every field in the Customize Mozilla News screen. You must fill in all fields, otherwise no customized news server settings will appear in your customized version of Mozilla 1.4.1.
- For short descriptions of the information to enter in each field, click the Help button. For examples of the settings that each field controls, click the corresponding Show Example buttons. Click Next when you are finished.
- Customize Proxy Configurations. This screen specifies the default proxy configurations that appear under the Advanced category when the user chooses Preferences from the Edit menu.
- For now, you won't specify any proxy configurations. Click Next to continue.
- Customize the CD Autorun Screen. This screen specifies the background, title bar text, and installation text file for the CD autorun screen that appears when a user inserts the CD with your custom installer on it.
Under Title Bar Text, enter your company name as you want it to appear in the screen's title bar and in the area below the title bar of the CD autorun screen. Then click Next to continue.
- Create the Installer. This screen specifies which Mozilla 1.4.1 components you want to install and up to two additional installers to include with the Mozilla 1.4.1 installer.
- Deselect any components in the list on the left that you don't want to include in your installer.
- Before building the installer, click To confirm the settings you have selected, click Show Config Info to confirm all the settings you've made to your configuration. If you see any errors, click the Back button repeatedly to return to the screen where the error occurred. After you've corrected any errors, click the Next button for each screen until you see the Create the Installer screen again.
- If you are sure all your settings are correct, click Build Installer to create your customized Mozilla 1.4.1 installer.
- When the CCK tool informs you that your installer has been created, click OK. The CCK tool creates your installer files in this location (where installation_directory is the directory where you installed the CCK tool and my_config is the directory name you specified in the first screen):
Once you've created a customized Mozilla installer, you should install your customized software in the same way your users will, so you can verify that all your customizations appear exactly as you intended. Follow these steps:
- Go to the directory that contains your customized installer and its associated files:
- Double-click the file
setup.exe. This causes the CD autorun screen to appear—the same screen your users will see when they insert the CD that contains your customized Mozilla installer.
- Examine the CD autorun screen to verify that it includes your company name in the title bar and in the area below the title bar.
- Click Install Mozilla 1.4.1 to launch the installer. Choose the Custom installation path so you can verify that the components installed by default are the same ones that you selected using the CCK tool.
- Choose About Mozilla 1.4.1 from the Help menu and verify your customized user agent string, which should appear near the top of the window. For example:
- Verify that the Mozilla program folder name in the Windows Start/Programs menu includes your company name.
- Click the Home button in the Navigator browser to verify that it takes you to the URL you specified, and check the browser window title bar to verify that it includes your company name.
- Verify that the Mail and News account settings are correct.
That's all there is to it. If these are the only customizations you want to make, you're ready to begin preparing for distribution:
- If you want to create a Linux or Macintosh installer, see Chapter 4 "Preparing Platform and Installer Information."
- If you want to create a Macintosh installer, you should also see Chapter 13 "Preparing Macintosh Installers and Program Files."
- When you are ready to distribute your installers, see Chapter 14 "Distributing Your Installers."
Copyright © 2003 Netscape Communications Corp. All rights reserved.
Last Updated July 30, 2003