Add-ons and Plug-insOptional for Computer Science
🎬 This chapter has a 12:38 video: Web Services →A browser out of the box does one job: fetch pages and show them. People wanted more — block advertisements, look up a word, save a password, play a video the browser could not play. So browsers were built to accept extra pieces.
1Add-ons
Add-ons are downloaded from the browser’s own store — the Chrome Web Store, Firefox Add-ons — and can be switched off or removed from the browser’s Extensions page.
Install an add-on and the same page comes out different. Nothing about the website changed — only the browser did.
The programme begins at 5 pm in the auditorium.
No add-ons: the plain browser, showing the page exactly as the website sent it.
2Plug-ins
3The difference
| Add-on (extension) | Plug-in | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Extra software inside the browser | A separate program the browser calls |
| What it does | Adds a feature to the browser itself | Plays one type of content inside a page |
| Works on | The browser, and every page you open | Only the content it was made for |
| Installed from | The browser's add-on store | Downloaded and installed on the computer |
| Examples | Ad blocker, dictionary, dark theme, password manager | Adobe Flash Player, Java applet plug-in, old PDF readers |
| Today | In everyday use | Obsolete — removed from modern browsers |
Fitting out a car
4From the board papers
▶Show the answer
An add-on is extra software installed into the browser that adds a new feature to the browser itself, and works on every page — for example an ad blocker. A plug-in is a separate program the browser calls on to display one particular kind of content inside a page that the browser cannot handle by itself — for example the old Adobe Flash Player.
▶Show the answer
Plug-in: a separate program used by a web browser to play or display a specific type of content inside a web page, such as an animation or a video, which the browser cannot display on its own.
Add-on: a small software component installed into a web browser to extend it with a new feature, such as blocking advertisements or looking up the meaning of a word.
Where add-ons are switched on and off, and the other choices a browser gives you, are on the Browser Settings page.
5Check yourself
A dictionary that shows the meaning of any word you double-click, on any website, is:
Adobe Flash Player, used to run animations inside a web page, was an example of:
Which one can change how every page you open is displayed?