"Invalid manifest" error when uploading an update

[Sergey Andryukhin]

hi!

I have an extension with manifest 2. Today I tried to upload new version with only description was changed (and add-on's version number) - nothing else was changed.

The dashboard gives me the error: "An error occurred: Invalid manifest. If your manifest includes comments, please remove them as our gallery does not support them yet."

I'm sure there are no comments in manifest file.

More notes:

- the description resides in _locale/en/messages.json file and it's length is 124 chars (fits to 132 chars limit).

- tried to upload several times during ~2.5 hours - no success.

How can I know what is the actual problem?

[Jan Mechtel]

Can you post the actual description before and after? maybe there are some special characters in it?

[Sergey Andryukhin]

sure,

this is a commit on github:

https://github.com/mywot/chrome/commit/f70fbe28595d27b8b7a8498843e853f7c3a8c3d8#_locales/en/messages.json

and this is actually manifest changes:

https://github.com/mywot/chrome/commit/2ae2c3912a7b1c154cdf3d60a08b98e3e6444b0f

I also had an assumption that other locales might affect and cut descriptions in all locales to fit to 132 chars, but this didn't help.

[Jan Mechtel]

It'd say it's worth a try to remove the quotes ' from User' and Chrome's

[Sergey Andryukhin]

ok, just tried to remove that single quotes completely from description - didn't help.

[Yoono]

I have the exact same issue, and my manifest file didn't change from the last one (except for the version number) that I posted on July 4th.

[Kyle Kinney]

Yeah, I'm having this issue, too. I poked at it for a while, and it looks like the app store is rejecting any manifest larger than about 1200 characters - I literally pared down a manifest to the point that it was accepted, then added a bunch of 'b's to a url, and it stopped working.

[Mihai Parparita]

Thanks for the additional details, I've reported this issue to the Web Store engineers.

Mihai

On Wed, Aug 1, 2012 at 11:32 AM, Kyle Kinney <ky...@playrific.com> wrote:

Yeah, I'm having this issue, too. I poked at it for a while, and it looks like the app store is rejecting any manifest larger than about 1200 characters - I literally pared down a manifest to the point that it was accepted, then added a bunch of 'b's to a url, and it stopped working.

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[Steve Streza]

I also am seeing this issue. Our v1 manifest.json file in an update was 1,536 bytes, and got rejected. Stripping out whitespace got the manifest.json down to 1,153 bytes. The server then accepted it.

[Kevie Ware]

I'm coming across the same error also with my manifest ver.2. I even omitted my white-spaces in the manifest.json and gotten it down to 1400 bytes but the server is still rejecting it. Pretty annoying to say the least. 

[Michael Hart / Awesome New Tab Page]

Try zipping the file with no compression (in WinRAR, "Store Only").

This solved the problem for me. Weird, I know.

[Abraham Williams]

Store only works for me too. On a Mac terminal you can use `zip -r -0 extension.zip src/*`

Abraham
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[Sergey Andryukhin]

Thanks! That works for me too.

[Lior Bornshtain]

After changing the manifest.json to version:2 and storing the extension in a zip, the web store does not complain.

However, when uploading I get a 503 error following with that one:

POST https://chrome.google.com/webstore/developer/upload?upload_id=AEnB2UpMWxudSlMzztMcbhglmsocLP5qomHRRsUr909bZQCDRGLzlCiP0dCbu1cOi0hNftdrKJlFE6gl3Qn3-mxZi9HQ9-ximw&file_id=000 Request throttled. Visit http://dev.chromium.org/throttling for more information.

Is the store service is really un-available, or am I doing something wrong ?

Thanks in advance

/Lior.

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[PhistucK]

Try a few minutes later, there might have been a momentary error.

☆PhistucK

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[Mihai Parparita]

On Wed, Aug 1, 2012 at 11:35 AM, Mihai Parparita <mih...@chromium.org> wrote:

Thanks for the additional details, I've reported this issue to the Web Store engineers.

There is indeed an issue with extracting manifest files from .zip files. A fix will be released in the next Web Store release sometime next week. In the meantime, turning off compression when generating the .zip file is a workaround.

Mihai

[Alan Hamlett]

I ran into the same issue. Fixed it by combining lines in my manifest to shorten the file, so it seems like a file size issue?

Here is the commit that fixed the issue:

https://github.com/alanhamlett/CLMapper/commit/db2aa3dc7cbb6198f7247d9c77e1257f526aed3f

I was receiving the same error message about "if there are comments remove them".

On Thursday, August 2, 2012 2:25:16 PM UTC-7, Mihai Parparita wrote:

[Pavel Reva]

Had same issue  "An error occurred: Invalid manifest. If your manifest includes comments, please remove them as our gallery does not support them yet.". Same manifest version with same params as I had in previous version of my extension which was successfully uploaded before. 

Fixed that with:

- added every single resource (js, styles, images, htmls) app is using to 'web_accessible_resources'

- removed 'include_globs' param from manifest since was getting warning in Chrome during last few days

Now, getting following errors in console:

- Uncaught TypeError: undefined is not a function in crxgallery_csi.js:263

- POST https://chrome.google.com/webstore/developer/upload?upload_id=AEnB2UoQcv9cpZ4ETzTmWYYqwH-CgUl8CRPSbovzktjaCHu4tj_e9XXDgq61rzevme1XAzV1HpstX23nXBecGetMu9cjfhgfoA&file_id=000 Request throttled. Visit http://dev.chromium.org/throttling for more information
- POST https://chrome.google.com/webstore/developer/upload?upload_id=AEnB2UoQcv9cpZ4ETzTmWYYqwH-CgUl8CRPSbovzktjaCHu4tj_e9XXDgq61rzevme1XAzV1HpstX23nXBecGetMu9cjfhgfoA&file_id=000 503 (Service Unavailable)

Hopefully, this is temporary issue in Web Store while processing zip files which will be fixed soon.

[Andy Mitchell]

Having the same issue: An error occurred: Invalid manifest. If your manifest includes comments, please remove them as our gallery does not support them yet.

I tried to upload using a zip file that had 0% compression; but it made no difference. (Using Abraham's compression command "zip -r -0 extension.zip src/*"). 

The manifest is 14kb. 

So I wondered if there was a problem with my manifest, and to test it, I uploaded an old version that had worked before, and still got the same error. So it doesn't appear it's my manifest.

Unless the requirements for the manifest have changed? 

Are we only allowed to use manifest version 2 now? 

Or as Pavel noted, do we have to specify every single 'web_accessible_resources', even on manifest version 1? 

[Paul Kinlan]

Can you send the manifest to the list. (Re description I thought the limit was 120 characters)

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[Alan Hamlett]

This might be the fix:

"The web store team has fixed this bug (it'll be in the next web store release, sometime this week)."

Posted August 6th, 2012 - http://code.google.com/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=140519

I created a new issue on the Chromium project including my error message and manifest file above and received that reply.

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 9:08:31 AM UTC-7, Paul Kinlan wrote:

Can you send the manifest to the list. (Re description I thought the limit was 120 characters)

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[Andy Mitchell]

Hi guys,

The failing manifest is at:

http://www.activeinboxhq.com/manifest_chromegallery.json

(The trademark icon doesn't render well in .json format online, but that's never been the cause of failure before). 

On Tuesday, August 7, 2012 5:08:31 PM UTC+1, Paul Kinlan wrote:

Can you send the manifest to the list. (Re description I thought the limit was 120 characters)

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[Mihai Parparita]

The Web Store bug fix has been released to production. Let me know if you're still having issues (and preferably, send me the .zip that you're trying to upload).

Mihai

[paulspringett]

Hi Mihai,

I'm still getting an error saying the manifest file is invalid when trying to install our extension from our site (using chrome.webstore.install()). Weirdly it uploads and publishes fine, and installs fine directly on the webstore page.

I've tried a compressed and uncompressed zip.

Can you advise a course of action please?

Regards,

Paul

[PhistucK]

Is the manifest saved as UTF-8?

☆PhistucK

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[paulspringett]

Hi PhistucK,

Yes it's a UTF-8 file.

Cheers,

Paul

[paulspringett]

Hi Mihai,

I got the following email from you, but cannot find it me this thread...?

Can you let me know what the webstore ID is (and what URL you're trying to install it from)?

Mihai

This is our extension here:

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/enignlfnollfkefdndmhkndmkilniegd

And we are trying to install it from here:

https://skadoo.sh/

(You'll need to sign in with a Facebook account).

Cheers,

Paul

On Wednesday, August 8, 2012 12:03:56 AM UTC+1, Mihai Parparita wrote:

[Dan Silver]

I'm also getting the invalid manifest error with an extension update. The extension works fine locally and uploads fine to the webstore, but when installing the extension from the preview page I get the error. I've uploaded a copy of the manifest.json file to https://gist.github.com/3310701. Thank you for any help!

[Dan Silver]

I uploaded the extension as a separate item to the chrome web store (didn't publish it) and it works fine.  So, I don't believe there's anything wrong with the manifest file itself.  This is very strange that I can't update the extension!

[Mihai Parparita]

This is a known Web Store issue with installing from the preview page during an update (the preview page is advertising the new version, but the downloaded .crx is the old version, and Chrome balks at the mismatch). All should be well once you publish.

Mihai

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[Andy Mitchell]

I've just tried to upload again after your changes were pushed to production, and still receive the same error ("An error occurred: Invalid manifest. If your manifest includes comments, please remove them as our gallery does not support them yet.")

The file is saved in UTF-8. 

You can see it at http://www.activeinboxhq.com/manifest_chromegallery.json

I'm guessing the problem is possibly not the one you fixed, maybe something that's been depreciated in the manifest (the manifest used to work)? 

[Andy Mitchell]

To further the experimentation, I removed all indentation and line returns from the manifest file, and removed the encoded 'TM' from the description. 

The upload failed again. 

[Mihai Parparita]

As a follow-up to anyone else who runs into this, the problem with Andy's extension turned out to be (another) Web Store bug: If you have another file in your zip (e.g. in a subdirectory) whose ends with "manifest.json", the Web Store would pick that file as the manifest instead, and complain about it being malformed.

I've reported the bug to the Web Store team, but renaming the file to remove the "manifest.json" suffix is a workaround in the meantime.

Mihai

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[Mukesh kumar Jat]

Having same problem

An error occurred: Invalid manifest. If your manifest includes comments, please remove them as our gallery does not support them yet.

. na thing is working for me :( any solution ?

[Scott Fujan]

Can you run JSON.parse on your manifest file? If not, you have a syntax error.

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[Jason Lawson]

I have the same problem , I thought it's because i'm a new dev and the chrome team are pinging my ip address , I then tried it on my friends computer , doesn't work , my next step is to try the drive they are so very proud of .. I jus dont get it ...should i give up? with a bullet to the head o end this aweful chrome experience??? where's the support chrome team??