Offline google chrome extensions

Question

Background

• I manage an autonomous network of workstations.
• I wrote a chrome extension, which must be in the browser for our webapp to function
• I published it through the chrome store (but did not make it publicly available).

Question

• How to install this extension without internet

What I tried:

• Windows Object: Requires the update URL to be http://clients2.google.com/service/update2/crx
• Windows registry: problem with the same url
• Unpacked extensions: requests users, requires developer tools and disables the extension when restarting chrome.
• install crx: disables the extension when restarting chrome.

Any other ideas or ways around this? Chrome version 48.

Answer 1

I got it to work in fact, unfortunately, I forgot about this post so far.

I had a business version installed as offered by @gerardnimo.

What i did is

1) and IIS server for servicing both CRX and xml updates. based on this guide. https://developer.chrome.com/extensions/autoupdate

2) Then I was able to install the extension using Group Policy.

Answer 2

I was able to do this on a regular chrome installation by following these steps:

• Download the extension in crx format - how to download a crx file from the chrome web store for a given identifier
• Unzip the crx file
• I had to rename the _metadata folder to metadata
• Open the chrome extension page
• Enable Developer Mode
• Click "Download Unpacked Extension ..."
• Select the unzipped folder

This worked for me when I needed to install the Advanced REST client.

Answer 3

Here is the thread I found. He suggests using Google Chrome for business.

Starting September 3, 2015, installing additional Chrome extensions no longer works (and here) due to Google trying to prevent the download and installation of malicious extensions. To install the standalone version today, you need to install a signed pre-packaged full Chrome installation using Google Chrome for Business. This functionality is controlled by a list of policies. Or, according to this post, you can use your Dev or Canary channels to run any extension. Their latest builds can be found here.