Configuring a Private Instance of WebPagetest with Browser Extensions

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CONFIGURING A PRIVATE INSTANCE OFWEBPAGETEST WITH
BROWSER EXTENSIONS
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• Configuring a private instance of WebPagetest
  allows you to make modifications to test browser
  extensions such ad blockers. Out of the box, most
  of these extensions will not work well with
  WebPagetest. On an empty browser cache, they
  typically open a new tab and ask users to make
  configuration changes or ask for a donation.
  Updated copies of the extensions are available
  for download. Alternatively, instructions on how
  to configure on your own are provided below.
• For our ad blocker study we used the following
  steps
• Requirements
• Remote desktop software
• WebPagetest private instance
• Administrator access to private WebPagetest
  instance
• Modified AdBlock Plus extension
• Setup
• 1. Configure a private WebPagetest instance
  using these steps.
• 2. Remote desktop to the wpt agent instance where
  you want to set up these browsers along with
  extensions.
• 3. Install the AdBlock Plus extension
• a. Access Adblock Plus from chrome web store
• b. Go to chrome//extensions/ and note the
  extension ID of Adblock Plus. For example,
  signature extension_id cfhdojbkjhnklbpkdaibdccdd
  ilifddb

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c. Go to chrome//version/ and copy the Profile
Path. d. Open a terminal and cd into Profile
Path/Extensions/extension_id/version/lib e.
Open adblockplus.js in a text editor f. Modify
the following line to suppress ad blockers from
opening their default page. This enables AdBlock
Plus to work well with WebPagetest.
4. From the downloaded extension a. Save
extension.zip file on agents Desktop. b. Unzip
this file onto Desktop c. Note the path where
these folders were created. This will be needed
in step 6 example- C\Users\Administrator\Deskto
p\extension\adblockplus 5. Open the WebPagetest
driver settings. The configuration file for this
driver is located at C/WebPagetest/wptdriver.ini
6. Add the following settings to WebPagetest
driver settings file to load adblocking
extensions, where the load-extension value is the
path notated in step 3c
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7. SSH into your WebPagetest server and add the
following lines to the server settings file,
usually located at/var/www/WebPagetest/www/settin
gs/locations.ini
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8. Restart WebPagetest server. You should see the
following in your WebPagetest portal
With these steps you can test the impact
ad blockers or other browser extensions have on
the performance of your applications.
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