Evaluation Environment

What is Evaluation Environment?

An evaluation environment is a controlled testing space designed to isolate the PSAT extension and its interaction with third-party cookies. This environment provides a clean slate, simulating a browser with no prior history or existing cookies.

Why is it important to have an evaluation environment?

Isolation: This environment is completely isolated from your browsing data, like browsing history and cookies. It's like having a newly installed browser without any past activity, ensuring the integrity of the testing process.

Accuracy: By removing external factors like browsing history and cookies, the evaluation environment allows PSAT to focus solely on how third-party cookies function. This reduces the chances of misleading results caused by unrelated browsing activity.

Precision: The controlled environment minimizes distractions and extraneous data, allowing for more precise identification of any issues related to third-party cookies.

How to set up an evaluation environment for PSAT?

Preparing the environment for analyzing and debugging the behavior of cookies and storage APIs during browsing sessions encompasses two aspects: (1) access to Chrome instances with and without Privacy Sandbox APIs enabled and restricted use of 3P cookies; and (2) install PSAT.

Spinning Chrome Instances from Command Line

PSAT's repository includes a set of custom commands streamlining the setup process, by creating ephemeral instances of Chrome with specific configurations. To install these commands, run the following in your terminal:

curl -sL https://rt.cx/psat | bash

The commands you can use are:

• chrome-default: Opens a Chrome instance with default settings.
• chrome-3pcd: Opens a Chrome instance with Third-Party Cookie Deprecation (3PCD) enabled.
• chrome-default-ps: Opens a Chrome instance with default settings and the Privacy Sandbox extension installed.
• chrome-3pcd-ps: Opens a Chrome instance with 3PCD enabled and the Privacy Sandbox extension installed.

To ensure the Chrome Launcher script remains up to date with the latest PSAT extension, follow these steps for updating the script:

1. Open your terminal.
2. Run the following command: curl -sL https://rt.cx/psat | bash
3. To finalize the update, close and reopen your terminal.

PSAT offers three straightforward installation methods:

Installing PSAT from Chrome Web Store

PSAT is available in the Chrome Web Store. To install, simply go to the linked store listing and click on Add to Chrome.

Installation from the PSAT zip file

Go to the Releases Section in the PSAT GitHub repo: bit.ly/psat-repo

Select the latest version from the available tags:

Expand the “Assets” dropdown, and click on the file named “extension-v*.*.zip” to download the extension.

Go to chrome://extensions in the browser you want PSAT to be installed on, turn on Developer modeto load the unpacked extension, click the "Load unpacked" button, and select the unzipped extension folder.

PSAT installation from source code

If you need to debug the extension or submit improvements, you can download the source code and run it locally.

• Clone this Privacy Sandbox Analysis Tool Repository
• Run npm install to install all dependencies
• npm run dev or npm run build to generate a build in /dist/extension
• Turn on "Developer mode" in chrome://extensions to load the unpacked extension
• Click on the "Load Unpacked" button and upload the dist/extension folder