Missing manifest.json when uploading Firefox Add-on to AMO

Question

I'm unable to upload my firefox extension using the form provided by mozilla. I'm constantly getting the error Your add-on failed validation with 2 errors. No install.rdf or manifest.json foundAdd-on missing manifest, which is very misleading because my application has a manifest.json.

The manifest.json looks like this:

{
"manifest_version": 2,
"version": 1.0,
"name": "my-extension-name",
"description": "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet",
"background": {
   "scripts": ["js/background.js"]
},
"main": "popup.js",
"browser_action": {
  "default_icon": "img/icon_grey.png",
  "default_popup": "popup.html",
  "default_title": "loremipsum"
},
"engines": {
  "firefox": ">=38.0a1"
},
"permissions": [
  "activeTab",
  "tabs",
  "background",
  "http://*/*",
  "https://*/*",
  "notifications",
  "alarms",
  "storage",
  "webRequest",
  "webRequestBlocking",
  "clipboardRead"
]
}

What is missing for this to work?

Answer 1

I was running into the same problem but all of these instructions didn't solve it. What i always did was to pack the whole folder, hence the manifest.json was not on the first level, when unpacked.

SOLUTION FOR ME

Select all files, instead of the folder, and then pack them as one .zip file and it should work. At least it did for me.

Here is a link to the MDN Documentation.

Answer 2

The very simple answer to this is that its unable to find the manifest in your zip file. This is caused because when you take a file and zip it using the default compressor in windows it takes the file and throws it into a sub folder of the zip file you created...

before compressing

folderYouWantCompressed -FileInFolder.html -Manifest.json

after compressing it will look like this

nameOfZip.zip -folderYouWantCompressed -FileInFolder.html -Manifest.json

but what you want is

nameOfZip.zip -FileInFolder.html -Manifest.json

the reason Oliver Sauter answer works is because when you select all the files within the "folderYouWantCompressed" it compresses without the sub folder meaning you dont run into this problem and it has no problem finding the manifest file.

for what I can tell the "correct answer" seems to be signing the add-on itself and is able to get the manifest file properly, so it does work but just seems like a 3rd party way of doing it (I did not look into it too deeply)

Note: that I originally had my issue solved by looking at Oliver Sauter post I just wanted to make it clear for future people looking at this post.

Answer 3

When you open your addon package zip file, the manifest.json file should be visible to you in order to upload it on AMO.

In your case, it looks like when you open your package zip, there is a folder and inside that folder manifest.json is located.