How can I refer the plugin settings from contentScript?

uphy · 6 March 2021 08:04

I'm developing a plugin that enables embedding PlantUML diagrams in markdown.

I have defined settings like below:

uphy/joplin-plantuml-plugin/blob/aa11e3b27e9f90680e54711bb07b7d7fbe32573f/src/settings.ts#L15-L38


export async function registerSettings() {
    await joplin.settings.registerSection(settingSection, {
        label: 'PlantUML',
        iconName: 'fas fa-sitemap'
    });

    await joplin.settings.registerSetting(settingKeyOpenMarker, {
        type: SettingItemType.String,
        value: '@startuml',
        description: 'String to use as opening delimiter.',
        section: settingSection,
        public: true,
        label: 'Open Marker'
    });

    await joplin.settings.registerSetting(settingKeyCloseMarker, {
        type: SettingItemType.String,
        value: '@enduml',
        description: 'String to use as closing delimiter.',
        section: settingSection,

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And I have tried to refer the settings from here in contentScript

github.com

uphy/joplin-plantuml-plugin/blob/aa11e3b27e9f90680e54711bb07b7d7fbe32573f/src/markdownItPlantUmlPlugin.ts#L4-L9


const markdownItPlantUml = require('markdown-it-plantuml');
markdownIt.use(markdownItPlantUml, {
    // How can I refer settings from here?
    openMarker: '@startuml',
    closeMarker: '@enduml',
});

But it seems that we can't use plugin's API from there.

How can I refer the plugin settings from contentScript?

roman_r_m · 6 March 2021 08:27

Send a message to your plugin, get settings in the plugin, send the result back to the contentscript.

uphy · 6 March 2021 08:46

Thank you for your reply!

I have defined onMessage() which returns settings and tried to get the settings from contentScript,

But it seems not allowed for markdown-it plugin.

loadContentScripts: context.postMessage is not available to renderer content scripts

github.com

laurent22/joplin/blob/e595e19c0daa2f68792885b4b9b55960ccefff16/packages/lib/services/plugins/utils/loadContentScripts.ts#L18-L20


		if (scriptType === ContentScriptType.MarkdownItPlugin) {
			logger.error('context.postMessage is not available to renderer content scripts');
		} else {

laurent · 6 March 2021 09:58

Hmm, I don't think that's possible actually. You can post messages from the HTML that the content script generates, but you can't when you instantiate the Markdown-it plugin. Maybe some way to do this should be provided via the context variable.

laurent · 6 March 2021 10:01

If I may make a suggestion, it would make sense to use a fence like this to delimit the UML code:

```plantuml
Bob -> Alice : Hello
```

That would be consistent with how it's done for Mermaid, Fountain, etc.

uphy · 6 March 2021 10:27

Thank you for the suggestion!
Now I'm using it as fence.

By the way, I want to switch PlantUML server by settings.
Currently I'm using a public PlantUML server. This means that we can't use this plugin with confidential information.

To switch the server, would you consider to give us a way to get settings from content script?

laurent · 6 March 2021 10:32

Yes I think we should add this. Calling postMessage at this point would be tricky because it's async, and that function is synchronous. Perhaps it's a matter of allowing to pass variables from the plugins via the context parameter.

uphy · 6 March 2021 10:37

It's nice idea. I'm looking forward to the feature being implemented.

rxliuli · 6 March 2021 16:55

I do not recommend to provide it directly, because there are too many tool libraries for encapsulating postMessage/onMessage, the most typical one is ChromeLab’s comlink, ref: GitHub - GoogleChromeLabs/comlink: Comlink makes WebWorkers enjoyable.

ocelotsloth · 31 March 2021 16:12

+1

@uphy I just went down this same path trying to modify your plugin to add the ability to change the PlantUML server.

For a variety of reasons I cannot use the public PlantUML server for work.

In the meantime--I'll just run a custom version of your plugin that hard-codes the change.