react: Devtools v4 does not work with Firefox's private window

Do you want to request a feature or report a bug?

bug
This issue has been reported in https://github.com/facebook/react-devtools/issues/1383

What is the current behavior?

Steps to Reproduce is here:

Environments are:
Open the page which uses react with a private window.
Open Firefox’s devtools.

Actual Result is:

react devtools’ component pane show Unable to find React on the page.
From about:debugging, we can see the below messsage:

SecurityError: Permission denied to access property "container" on cross-origin object main.js:51:305877
    Kl moz-extension://56db142d-3d36-b04e-91ca-a7504c7708a5/build/main.js:51
    apply self-hosted:4417
    applySafeWithoutClone resource://gre/modules/ExtensionCommon.jsm:588
    asyncWithoutClone resource://gre/modules/ExtensionCommon.jsm:2400

What is the expected behavior?

react devtools work

Which versions of React, and which browser / OS are affected by this issue? Did this work in previous versions of React?

Firefox 68
react devtools v4.0.5
react v16.9

About this issue

Original URL
State: open
Created 5 years ago
Reactions: 25
Comments: 22 (5 by maintainers)

Most upvoted comments

Still experiencing this. Any updates? I need to use private mode when testing. Firefox v73.0 (64bit) React Developer Tools 4.4.0

+13

mattm-malone on Feb 17, 2020

This is still an issue for me. Any movement on it?

It used to work just fine. But I don’t remember what version that was.

jaimeburnap-fts on Jan 3, 2020

If you just want a ‘clean’ browser install (without previously placed cookies, storage etc.) for debugging purposes and if you are using Private Windows to accomplish this (and not for testing the Private Windows specifically), Containers might be a handy workaround!

You can make temporary containers with a single button-press using this plugin: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/temporary-containers/

Firefox’s containers are criminally underrated 😃

KilledMufasa on Sep 21, 2021

I’ll take a look at this one. 👍

I’ll try and provide you with an update by the end of the week.

hristo-kanchev on Sep 19, 2019

Issue exists on Firefox Developer Edition 81.0b3, React devtools 4.8.2. I do almost all my dev work in private windows, this makes the tool less than useful.

grahamb on Aug 31, 2020

Here is a high level overview of the architecture: https://github.com/facebook/react/blob/master/packages/react-devtools/OVERVIEW.md

And here is how to build and test the extension: https://github.com/facebook/react/tree/master/packages/react-devtools-extensions#local-development

bvaughn on May 5, 2021

This issue is affecting my work on some performance issues for a client. I’m gonna start taking a look, but I’ve never built a browser extension before. If anyone has any tips, let me know! 😃

nloding on May 5, 2021

Same issue here; i like to use private windows to test my apps with all browser extensions disabled and DevTools do not work (the extension is allowed to run in private windows) Firefox: 79.0 React Developer Tools: 4.8.2

sqwxl on Aug 20, 2020

@hristo-kanchev any update on this? Very annoying when you do all your web work with Firefox and use private windows.

elbro on Jul 7, 2020

I’m also encountering this. React Developer Tools can find react on https://reactjs.org/ normally, but not in private mode.

FireFox: 76.0.1 React Developer Tools: 4.7.0

WMahoney09 on Jul 1, 2020

I’ve just encountered this issue as well with React Developer Tools 4.7.0 and Firefox 77.0.1. Are there any plans of solving it?

Jonarzz on Jun 19, 2020