Enable 32-bit plugins in 64-bit Mozilla

Summary

Moving to a full 64-bit Linux operating system is a nifty task indeed. There's just one small, yet largely annoying problem that all 64-bit users find: all those fancy plugins for your web browser will not work, nor do they exist, for your 64-bit browser. And, sadly, it looks like it'll be a LONG time before it happens.

But there is one solution that seems to yield pretty darn good results: enter 'nspluginwrapper', written by Gwenole Beauchesne. You can visit the project website at his wiki: http://www.gibix.net/dokuwiki/en:projects:nspluginwrapper.

EDIT: A spell, created by Morphic, now exists for nspluginwrapper.

 

Prerequisites

You'll need to cast smgl-emul32, a spell provided by Morphic. This will enable the execution of the 32-bit stuff:

scribe add z-rejected
cast smgl-emul32

 

Installing nspluginwrapper

I cannot vouch for other Linux distributions, but following is a set of instructions on how to install nspluginwrapper on a Source Mage GNU/Linux machine.

1. First, you'll need to download the two RPM packages (plugin wrapper and viewer) -- NOT the source tarballs. Note: I have tried compiling the tarballs, and even though everything went fine, I never got any plugins to launch. Turns out the key is to use the RPMs.

2. Next, use the rpmunpack tool to unpack both RPMs:

rpmunpack nspluginwrapper-0.9.90.1-1.x86_64.rpm
rpmunpack nspluginwrapper-i386-0.9.90.1-1.x86_64.rpm

3. Uncompress the cpio files:

gunzip -d nspluginwrapper-0.9.90.1-1.cpio.gz
gunzip -d nspluginwrapper-i386-0.9.90.1-1.cpio.gz

4. Create the installation directory and then change to the root of the filesystem:

mkdir -p /usr/lib/nspluginwrapper
cd /

5. You will need to use cpio to separate the files (assumed the .cpio files are in your home directory):

cpio -i < ~/nspluginwrapper-0.9.90.1-1.cpio
cpio -i < ~/nspluginwrapper-i386-0.9.90.1-1.cpio

6. Finally, copy the npwrapper.so found in /usr/lib/nspluginwrapper/x86_64 to /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins

 

Installing Flash Player

Finally, the moment you're been waiting for: it's time to install Flash Player. Visit Adobe's website: http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/download.cgi?P1_Prod_Version=ShockwaveFlash&promoid=BIOW. Note: Adobe aquired Macromedia in 2006, in case you hadn't heard.

Untar the downloaded file and copy the plugin to the proper location:

tar -xzvf install_flash_player_7_linux1.tar.gz
cp install_flash_player_7_linux/libflashplayer.so /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/

And finally, tell nspluginwrapper your new plugin is there:

# this will cause npconfig to verbosely search for and install all plugins it finds
/usr/lib/nspluginwrapper/x86_64/npconfig -v -a -i

# this will simply install one plugin
/usr/lib/nspluginwrapper/x86_64/npconfig -i /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins/libflashplayer.so

And that's it! The same process goes for nearly any plugin. The author of the wrapper has published on his website which plugins are known to work fairly well, but it doesn't hurt to give them all a shot...

 

Credits

Credit for this information goes to Morphic, as he so generously helped me get this working -- I merely wrote it down. He's in the process of writing a spell, so be on the lookout for that...