No they are not protected and havent been for a while and yes this will potentially cause issues with future upgrades

Thanks guys!

I partially tracked this down to:
http://joomlacode.org/gf/project/joomla/tracker/?action=TrackerItemEdit&tracker_item_id=28269

and:
http://joomlacode.org/gf/project/joomla/tracker/?action=TrackerItemEdit&tracker_item_id=28833

Summary:
In J2.5.4, all protected extensions were made so that they can't be disabled. In ~J2.5.7, the following core extensions had the protected status removed:
com_search
mod_articles_archive
mod_articles_latest
mod_banners
mod_feed
mod_footer
mod_users_latest
mod_articles_category
mod_articles_categories
plg_content_pagebreak
plg_content_pagenavigation
plg_content_vote
plg_editors_tinymce
plg_system_p3p
plg_user_contactcreator
plg_user_profile

I'm not sure when Contacts, Newsfeeds (other than mod_feed), and Weblinks, but they were likely intentional too based on the reasoning in JoomlaCode 28833.

For any dependency issues or upgrade issues resulting from uninstalling, let's open them up as separate issues.

What is the problem you are trying to solve?

On 9 September 2014 18:50, Nick Savov notifications@github.com wrote:

Thanks guys!

I partially tracked this down to:

http://joomlacode.org/gf/project/joomla/tracker/?action=TrackerItemEdit&tracker_item_id=28269

and:

http://joomlacode.org/gf/project/joomla/tracker/?action=TrackerItemEdit&tracker_item_id=28833

Summary:
In J2.5.4, all protected extensions were made so that they can't be
disabled. In ~J2.5.7, the following core extensions had the protected
status removed:
com_search
mod_articles_archive
mod_articles_latest
mod_banners
mod_feed
mod_footer
mod_users_latest
mod_articles_category
mod_articles_categories
plg_content_pagebreak
plg_content_pagenavigation
plg_content_vote
plg_editors_tinymce
plg_system_p3p
plg_user_contactcreator
plg_user_profile

I'm not sure when Contacts, Newsfeeds (other than mod_feed), and Weblinks,
but they were likely intentional too based on the reasoning in JoomlaCode
28833.

For any dependency issues or upgrade issues resulting from uninstalling,
let's open them up as separate issues.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub
#4219 (comment).

Brian Teeman
Co-founder Joomla! and OpenSourceMatters Inc.
http://brian.teeman.net/

We solved things on our site, but trying to mitigate issues for new users or users in general.

Check https://twitter.com/stevejburge/status/507633878354235392 for potential issues.

The protected flag IMO is probably being abused massively. It should only be used on extensions that if they were removed, the CMS would critically fail. The biggest fail condition without those extensions is in the database schema. Filesystem changes aren't as bad, but you constantly get the files restored to your site when performing updates.

None of the unprotected extensions cause critical failure, just headaches come update day. Protecting those extensions makes users who are capable of removing unused extensions and handling update issues accordingly unable to do just that. It's almost a "do at your own risk" thing.

+1

Agree with Michael . Thats why it was removed all that time ago

On 9 September 2014 21:09, Michael Babker notifications@github.com wrote:

The protected flag IMO is probably being abused massively. It should only
be used on extensions that if they were removed, the CMS would critically
fail. The biggest fail condition without those extensions is in the
database schema. Filesystem changes aren't as bad, but you constantly get
the files restored to your site when performing updates.

None of the unprotected extensions cause critical failure, just headaches
come update day. Protecting those extensions makes users who are capable of
removing unused extensions and handling update issues accordingly unable to
do just that. It's almost a "do at your own risk" thing.

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub
#4219 (comment).

Brian Teeman
Co-founder Joomla! and OpenSourceMatters Inc.
http://brian.teeman.net/