Home Assistant Add-On: Firefox

Share your Projects!
,
1

Home Assistant Add-on: Firefox

Run Firefox as a browser inside Home Assistant to access local or external web sites from your home.

Use your old tablet / iPad with Home Assistant.

Supports aarch64 Architecture Supports amd64 Architecture Supports armv7 Architecture Supports i386 Architecture

This is my first Home Assistant Add-on and my first repo. I’ll try my best to improve things based on your feedback, thank you!

image
image1273×623 65.4 KB

About

Mozilla Firefox is a free and open-source web browser developed by Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, Mozilla Corporation.

This add-on is based on the docker image from Jocelyn Le Sage.

A huge thank to him for the great containers created and maintained.
He’s the real hero who needs to be supported.

GitHub repo: GitHub - Mincka/ha-addons: My Home Assistant Add-ons

Installation

Add repository on my Home Assistant

If you want to do add the repository manually, please follow the procedure highlighted in the Home Assistant website. Use the following URL to add this repository: https://github.com/mincka/ha-addons

Refresh your browser and install the add-on from the new repository:

image

How to use

Just install, start the container and click on “Open Web UI”. You can use “Show in sidebar” for easy access. Everything you do is persisted in Firefox. Even if you stop the Add-on or restart Home Assistant host OS.

Usage for iPad / Tablet

Typical settings for iPad 3:

FF_OPEN_URL: http://x.x.x.x:8123/
FF_KIOSK: "1"
DISPLAY_WIDTH: "2048"
DISPLAY_HEIGHT: "1536"

Set a port for VNC to expose it from your HA instance:

image
image1067×426 15.9 KB

It is recommended to use RealVNC but it can be tricky to install if you have an old iPad and no other iOS device. Cf. this topic for some methods: Options for Lovelace on older iPad (ios 9.3.5) - #103 by yangtfu

Downloads

The files downloaded in Firefox are automatically stored to your /share/firefox folder.

Uploads

If you need to upload files through the Firefox add-on, you can use the File editor add-on to upload the files to your /share/firefox folder. The files will be available in the downloads folder of the add-on. You can browse to this location when you select the files to upload.

Import bookmarks

You can import bookmarks.html file by dropping them in your /share/firefox folder and import the bookmarks.html file in Firefox.

Todo

  • Make it compatible with apparmor
  • Looks like there is some kind of timeout when the addon is not used 60 seconds when using Nabu Casa. This looks like something I can fix this by using a reverse proxy setup.

More in the pipe

I plan to also release an add-on with a full desktop. :slight_smile:

Sponsoring :heart:

If you like this add-on and would like to support my work, you can buy me a coffee. :coffee:

Sponsoring available on GitHub (Sponsor @Mincka on GitHub Sponsors · GitHub) and Paypal (PayPal.Me).

28 Likes
2

This is awesome! Finally a simple way for me to remotely access internal websites (device GUI’s) without having to use proxies etc to bypass the HTTPS limitation.

Thank you :slight_smile:

3 Likes
3

this looks like a neat addon.

1 Like
4

Tried to use on my Raspberry PI3A+… and … it’s almost unusable… too slow… the system stop responding completelly when using it…
:frowning:

5

It works great!

Thank you!

1 Like
6

Would you be able to add this ssh addon to your project??

7

You’re free to install any extension you want. The Firefox profile is persisted so you will keep your extensions and settings.

For SSH connections, I’d would recommend to use the Guacamole addon from Alexbelgium

You can use it to configure multiple connections for VNC, RDP, SSH…

image
image1125×808 144 KB

8

This is amazing. So many use cases for me, thank you.

1 Like
10

Great idea but same experience. Doesn’t work on RPI3B+ 1GB, too slow and stops randomly. What are the minimum system requirements?

11

Very cool. Running quite fine on a RPi 4 with 8 GB of RAM and slightly overclocked (within guarantee limits). Memory consumption is quite extensive though, roughly 500 MB in standby, up to 1 GB with a few simple tabs and a bit of surfing, will of course heavily depend on what is shown (probably video streaming will stress it heavily).

In terms of security of course one should keep in mind this makes access to your local resources even easier (scenario: someone got access to your HA instance). Depending on the individual setup probably just a theoretical thing.

Is it possible to use key combinations like e. g. Ctrl + t for a new tab? Even when in fullscreen mode, the actual browser (used for displaying HA / ingress / Firefox, also Firefox in my case) catches those unfortunately which makes efficient browsing a bit uncomfortable.

12

I don’t think it’s possible. It’s up to the browser (and before to the OS) to forward keyboard shortcuts to a web site or not. It’s done in noVNC by adding buttons to the interface to send special shortcuts like ctrl+alt+del but in your case, it would not be relevant since it’s the same than clicking the “+” icon to open a new tab.

Ref: https://groups.google.com/g/novnc/c/sX7-T69ZrCg/m/6tOrPfwJBAAJ

13

It is indeed remarkable!
Of course, it is a breach of security… But it may be so usefull in some rare cases. I will not automatically start it on reboot and not showed in side bar and start it only in need.
Truth is if someone hacks my HA, and manage to break in, the intruder might install this addon by himself. :yum:

14

A new “Edge” version is available. It’s based on Alpine Edge and attempts to update Firefox each time the container (re)start. The original version is now always using the repository and version of the base image.

2 Likes
16

I’m getting the following error: Firefox disconnected on both versions.

17

is there a way to integrate it like a web card (iframe)? or dashboard for non admin user?

1 Like
18

Are you maintaining both versions of the add-on, or do you recommend migrating to the Edge version?

Also, any luck figuring out the 60 second timeout on nabu casa?

19

Really interesting option! I have tryed with guacamole but it seems impossible.

20

I installed it today on my Raspberry 4. We just went on hols from our new house, and I forgot I did not setup yet the vpn server on the router… Which in turn meant I could not login to the network with my ohone, which also meant I could not set the cctvs on my NAS to be in away mode…
But Home Assistant is accessible.
I installed the firefox edge, logged in to the router from there, enabled the Open VPN server and configured a user, stopped the browser add ons and voila’, I was able to vpn again to my router and set my cctvs in away mode!
Thanks, I am so grateful for you add on!

As someone mentioned, just keep your Home Assistant access protected and the software patched to the latest version, to be safe :slight_smile:

1 Like
21

Is there a way to approach this outside of Home Assistant? ie: http://homeassistantipaddres:PORT ?
Reason I’m asking is I want to use this addon to be able to use Home Assistant on an old Ipad…

22

Not yet but I will add the ability to expose ports to connect over VNC + web.

1 Like