Develop Reference

firefox addon: cannot update tab URL using web extension

I'd like to know how to update URL addresses in Firefox using Web Extensions.
I'm trying to port a simple extension I've created with Chrome APIs to Firefox, but I don't really understand the tab URL mechanisms in Firefox.
This extension was made to switch between YouTube desktop/TV version with a click.
It works well on Chrome, but I don't know why it's not working on Firefox.
UPDATE 1: Placing most important code block related to the question:
chromeApi.browserAction.onClicked.addListener(function(tab) {
var actionUrl = '';
var tabUrl = tab.url;
if (getCurrentPageVersion(tabUrl) !== undefined) {
actionUrl = getConvertedActionUrl(tabUrl);
if (actionUrl !== tabUrl) {
chromeApi.tabs.update(tab.id, {url: actionUrl});
}
}
});
Full source
(function(chromeApi) {
getCurrentPageVersion = function (tabUrl) {
var ytValidRegex = /^(https?\:\/\/)?(www\.)?(youtube\.com|youtu\.?be)/g;
var ytValidStdPageRegex = /^(https?\:\/\/)?(www\.)?(youtube\.com|youtu\.?be)?(\/watch\?v=).+$/g;
var ytValidTvPageRegex = /^(https?\:\/\/)?(www\.)?(youtube\.com|youtu\.?be)?(\/tv#\/watch(\/video)?\/(idle|control)\?v=).+$/g;
if (!ytValidRegex.test(tabUrl)) {
return undefined;
} else if (ytValidStdPageRegex.test(tabUrl)) {
return "std";
} else if (ytValidTvPageRegex.test(tabUrl)) {
return "tv";
}
return undefined;
};
getConvertedActionUrl = function (tabUrl) {
var result = '';
var shortStdYtUrlRegex = /\/watch\?v=.+/g;
var shortTvYtUrlRegex = /\/tv#\/watch\/video\/(idle|control)\?v=.+/g;
var shortStdYtUrlReplaceRegex = /\/watch\?v=/g;
var shortTvYtUrlReplaceRegex = /\/tv#\/watch\/video\/(idle|control)\?v=/g;
if (shortStdYtUrlRegex.test(tabUrl)) {
result = tabUrl.replace(shortStdYtUrlReplaceRegex, '/tv#/watch/idle?v=');
}
else {
result = tabUrl.replace(shortTvYtUrlReplaceRegex, '/watch?v=');
}
// YouTube standard website video url
//https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tRDQK2MtRs
// YouTube TV url
//https://www.youtube.com/tv#/watch/video/idle?v=9tRDQK2MtRs
return result;
}
onInit = function () {
};
// Called when the user clicks on the browser action.
chromeApi.browserAction.onClicked.addListener(function(tab) {
var actionUrl = '';
var tabUrl = tab.url;
if (getCurrentPageVersion(tabUrl) !== undefined) {
actionUrl = getConvertedActionUrl(tabUrl);
if (actionUrl !== tabUrl) {
chromeApi.tabs.update(tab.id, {url: actionUrl});
}
}
});
chromeApi.tabs.onUpdated.addListener(function(tabId, changeInfo, tab){
if(!changeInfo.url) return; // URL did not change
// Might be better to analyze the URL to exclude things like anchor changes
var pageVersion = getCurrentPageVersion(tab.url);
if (pageVersion === undefined) return;
/* ... */
chromeApi.browserAction.setBadgeText({text: pageVersion.toUpperCase(), tabId: tab.id});
});
chromeApi.tabs.onCreated.addListener(function(tab){
var pageVersion = getCurrentPageVersion(tab.url);
if (pageVersion === undefined) return;
/* ... */
chromeApi.browserAction.setBadgeText({text: pageVersion.toUpperCase(), tabId: tab.id});
});
})(chrome);
If you pay attention, the core functionality happens on the chromeApi.browserAction.onClicked event, whenever you click the add-on/extension button.
The extension updates correctly between each YouTube version in Chrome, but in Firefox, this one redirects to YouTube TV once and never goes back to the desktop version no matter how many times you click on it.
But there's something weird in Firefox: browser history is updated correctly whenever the tab.update method is called, but it redirects to the TV version by itself again.
IMPORTANT: Both Firefox/Chrome extensions are using the currentTab permission, so it's not an extension issue by itself.
Extension on GitHub
UPDATE 2 (2018-11-25): I've updated the source code based on previous feedback

Firefox Addon observer http-on-modify-request not working properly

I have a weird bug in my addon,
the addon itself needs to add a request header parameters for a specific domain,
it's all working, but the bug is, that the observer http-on-modify-request is not called at start, only if I reload the page, then it's working.
I mean:
I go to mysite.com/ - no header modified,
I reload page - header modefied
reload again - header modefied
new tab at mysite.com/ - no header modified
reload tab - header modefied
My code, I'm using the addon sdk:
exports.main = function(options,callbacks) {
// Create observer
httpRequestObserver =
{
observe: function(subject, topic, data)
{
if (topic == "http-on-modify-request") {
//only identify to specific preference domain
var windowsService = Cc['#mozilla.org/appshell/window-mediator;1'].getService(Ci.nsIWindowMediator);
var uri = windowsService.getMostRecentWindow('navigator:browser').getBrowser().currentURI;
var domainloc = uri.host;
if (domainloc=="mysite.com"){
var httpChannel = subject.QueryInterface(Ci.nsIHttpChannel);
httpChannel.setRequestHeader("x-test", "test", false);
}
}
},
register: function()
{
var observerService = Cc["#mozilla.org/observer-service;1"]
.getService(Ci.nsIObserverService);
observerService.addObserver(this, "http-on-modify-request", false);
},
unregister: function()
{
var observerService = Cc["#mozilla.org/observer-service;1"]
.getService(Ci.nsIObserverService);
observerService.removeObserver(this, "http-on-modify-request");
}
};
//register observer
httpRequestObserver.register();
};
exports.onUnload = function(reason) {
httpRequestObserver.unregister();
};
Please help me, I searched for hours with no results.
The code is working, but not at first time of page loading,
only if I reload.
The goal is that only on mysite.com, there will be a x-text=test header request, all the time, but only on mysite.com.

currentUri on browser is the Uri that is currently loaded in the tab. At "http-on-modify-request" notification time, the request is not sent to the server yet, so if it's a new tab, the browser doesn't have any currentUri. When you refresh the tab in place, it uses the uri of the current page, and it seemingly works.
Try this instead:
if (topic == "http-on-modify-request") {
var httpChannel = subject.QueryInterface(Ci.nsIHttpChannel);
var uri = httpChannel.URI;
var domainloc = uri.host;
//only identify to specific preference domain
if (domainloc == "mysite.com") {
httpChannel.setRequestHeader("x-test", "test", false);
}
}

'load' event not firing when iframe is loaded in Chrome

I am trying to display a 'mask' on my client while a file is dynamically generated server side. Seems like the recommend work around for this (since its not ajax) is to use an iframe and listen from the onload or done event to determine when the file has actually shipped to the client from the server.
here is my angular code:
var url = // url to my api
var e = angular.element("<iframe style='display:none' src=" + url + "></iframe>");
e.load(function() {
$scope.$apply(function() {
$scope.exporting = false; // this will remove the mask/spinner
});
});
angular.element('body').append(e);
This works great in Firefox but no luck in Chrome. I have also tried to use the onload function:
e.onload = function() { //unmask here }
But I did not have any luck there either.
Ideas?

Unfortunately it is not possible to use an iframe's onload event in Chrome if the content is an attachment. This answer may provide you with an idea of how you can work around it.

I hate this, but I couldn't find any other way than checking whether it is still loading or not except by checking at intervals.
var timer = setInterval(function () {
iframe = document.getElementById('iframedownload');
var iframeDoc = iframe.contentDocument || iframe.contentWindow.document;
// Check if loading is complete
if (iframeDoc.readyState == 'complete' || iframeDoc.readyState == 'interactive') {
loadingOff();
clearInterval(timer);
return;
}
}, 4000);

You can do it in another way:
In the main document:
function iframeLoaded() {
$scope.$apply(function() {
$scope.exporting = false; // this will remove the mask/spinner
});
}
var url = // url to my api
var e = angular.element("<iframe style='display:none' src=" + url + "></iframe>");
angular.element('body').append(e);
In the iframe document (this is, inside the html of the page referenced by url)
window.onload = function() {
parent.iframeLoaded();
}
This will work if the main page, and the page inside the iframe are in the same domain.
Actually, you can access the parent through:
window.parent
parent
//and, if the parent is the top-level document, and not inside another frame
top
window.top
It's safer to use window.parent since the variables parent and top could be overwritten (usually not intended).

you have to consider 2 points:
1- first of all, if your url has different domain name, it is not possible to do this except when you have access to the other domain to add the Access-Control-Allow-Origin: * header, to fix this go to this link.
2- but if it has the same domain or you have added Access-Control-Allow-Origin: * to the headers of your domain, you can do what you want like this:
var url = // url to my api
var e = angular.element("<iframe style='display:none' src=" + url + "></iframe>");
angular.element(document.body).append(e);
e[0].contentWindow.onload = function() {
$scope.$apply(function() {
$scope.exporting = false; // this will remove the mask/spinner
});
};
I have done this in all kinds of browsers.

I had problems with the iframe taking too long to load. The iframe registered as loaded while the request wasn't handled. I came up with the following solution:
JS
Function:
function iframeReloaded(iframe, callback) {
let state = iframe.contentDocument.readyState;
let checkLoad = setInterval(() => {
if (state !== iframe.contentDocument.readyState) {
if (iframe.contentDocument.readyState === 'complete') {
clearInterval(checkLoad);
callback();
}
state = iframe.contentDocument.readyState;
}
}, 200)
}
Usage:
iframeReloaded(iframe[0], function () {
console.log('Reloaded');
})
JQuery
Function:
$.fn.iframeReloaded = function (callback) {
if (!this.is('iframe')) {
throw new Error('The element is not an iFrame, please provide the correct element');
}
let iframe = this[0];
let state = iframe.contentDocument.readyState;
let checkLoad = setInterval(() => {
if (state !== iframe.contentDocument.readyState) {
if (iframe.contentDocument.readyState === 'complete') {
clearInterval(checkLoad);
callback();
}
state = iframe.contentDocument.readyState;
}
}, 200)
}
Usage:
iframe.iframeReloaded(function () {
console.log('Reloaded');
})

I've just noticed that Chrome is not always firing the load event for the main page so this could have an effect on iframes too as they are basically treated the same way.
Use Dev Tools or the Performance api to check if the load event is being fired at all.
I just checked http://ee.co.uk/ and if you open the console and enter window.performance.timing you'll find the entries for domComplete, loadEventStart and loadEventEnd are 0 - at least at this current time:)
Looks like there is a problem with Chrome here - I've checked it on 2 PCs using the latest version 31.0.1650.63.
Update: checked ee again and load event fired but not on subsequent reloads so this is intermittent and may possibly be related to loading errors on their site. But the load event should fire whatever.
This problem has occurred on 5 or 6 sites for me now in the last day since I noticed my own site monitoring occasionally failed. Only just pinpointed the cause to this. I need some beauty sleep then I'll investigate further when I'm more awake.

Differences in Chrome on various OS

I'm developing a chrome extension and i've met a very strange bug - my code works well on Mac OS, but doesn't work on Windows and Linux versions of Chrome. Versions are the same.
function captureAllScreen() {
chrome.windows.getCurrent(function(w) {
chrome.tabs.captureVisibleTab(w.id, {"format":"png"}, function(response) {
var image = response;
var url;
chrome.tabs.getSelected(w.id, function(response) {
url = response.url;
});
var viewTabUrl = [chrome.extension.getURL('app.html'),
'?id=', id++].join('');
chrome.tabs.create({url: viewTabUrl}, function(tab) {
var targetId = tab.id;
var addSnapshotImageToTab = function(tabId, changedProps, tab) {
if (tabId != targetId || changedProps.status != "complete") {
return;
};
chrome.tabs.onUpdated.removeListener(addSnapshotImageToTab);
var views = chrome.extension.getViews();
for (var i = 0; i < views.length; i++) {
var view = views[i];
if (view.location.href == viewTabUrl) {
view.twm_Draw.sendScreen(image, url); //Application-specific method
break;
}
}
window.close();
};
chrome.tabs.onUpdated.addListener(addSnapshotImageToTab);
});
});
});
};
Update:
What i want to do with this code - is to take a screenshot and tab url and send it to my extension's page. When user clicks on my extension's icon - it opens a popup with two buttons, one of it fires this function.
In Mac Os everything works - this code takes a screenshot, tab url, opens new tab with my application and sends the data there. On Linux & Windows versions of chrome it doesn't send the data, after clicking the icon in the popup you just get a blank tab opened.

I think this part might be causing problems:
var url;
chrome.tabs.getSelected(w.id, function(response) {
url = response.url;
});
//using url
The rest of the code should be wrapped into callback function, otherwise order of execution is not guaranteed.

I'm guess it's only supported on Mac, whatever it does:
view.twm_Draw.sendScreen(image, url); //Application-specific method
I don't know about Unix but on Windows you can only get a screenshot using a NPAPI plugin like the Google extension for screen capture.

jQuery .ready in a dynamically inserted iframe

We are using jQuery thickbox to dynamically display an iframe when someone clicks on a picture. In this iframe, we are using galleria a javascript library to display multiple pictures.
The problem seems to be that $(document).ready in the iframe seems to be fired too soon and the iframe content isn't even loaded yet, so galleria code is not applied properly on the DOM elements. $(document).ready seems to use the iframe parent ready state to decide if the iframe is ready.
If we extract the function called by document ready in a separate function and call it after a timeout of 100 ms. It works, but we can't take the chance in production with a slow computer.
$(document).ready(function() { setTimeout(ApplyGalleria, 100); });
My question: which jQuery event should we bind to to be able to execute our code when the dynamic iframe is ready and not just it's a parent?

I answered a similar question (see Javascript callback when IFRAME is finished loading?).
You can obtain control over the iframe load event with the following code:
function callIframe(url, callback) {
$(document.body).append('<IFRAME id="myId" ...>');
$('iframe#myId').attr('src', url);
$('iframe#myId').load(function() {
callback(this);
});
}
In dealing with iframes I found good enough to use load event instead of document ready event.

Using jQuery 1.3.2 the following worked for me:
$('iframe').ready(function() {
$('body', $('iframe').contents()).html('Hello World!');
});
REVISION:!
Actually the above code sometimes looks like it works in Firefox, never looks like it works in Opera.
Instead I implemented a polling solution for my purposes. Simplified down it looks like this:
$(function() {
function manipIframe() {
el = $('body', $('iframe').contents());
if (el.length != 1) {
setTimeout(manipIframe, 100);
return;
}
el.html('Hello World!');
}
manipIframe();
});
This doesn't require code in the called iframe pages. All code resides and executes from the parent frame/window.

In IFrames I usually solve this problem by putting a small script to the very end of the block:
<body>
The content of your IFrame
<script type="text/javascript">
//<![CDATA[
fireOnReadyEvent();
parent.IFrameLoaded();
//]]>
</script>
</body>
This work most of the time for me. Sometimes the simplest and most naive solution is the most appropriate.

Following DrJokepu's and David Murdoch idea I implemented a more complete version.
It requires jQuery on both the parent and iframe and the iframe to be in your control.
iframe code:
var iframe = window.frameElement;
if (iframe){
iframe.contentDocument = document;//normalization: some browsers don't set the contentDocument, only the contentWindow
var parent = window.parent;
$(parent.document).ready(function(){//wait for parent to make sure it has jQuery ready
var parent$ = parent.jQuery;
parent$(iframe).trigger("iframeloading");
$(function(){
parent$(iframe).trigger("iframeready");
});
$(window).load(function(){//kind of unnecessary, but here for completion
parent$(iframe).trigger("iframeloaded");
});
$(window).unload(function(e){//not possible to prevent default
parent$(iframe).trigger("iframeunloaded");
});
$(window).on("beforeunload",function(){
parent$(iframe).trigger("iframebeforeunload");
});
});
}
parent test code:
$(function(){
$("iframe").on("iframeloading iframeready iframeloaded iframebeforeunload iframeunloaded", function(e){
console.log(e.type);
});
});

Found the solution to the problem.
When you click on a thickbox link that open a iframe, it insert an iframe with an id of TB_iframeContent.
Instead of relying on the $(document).ready event in the iframe code, I just have to bind to the load event of the iframe in the parent document:
$('#TB_iframeContent', top.document).load(ApplyGalleria);
This code is in the iframe but binds to an event of a control in the parent document. It works in FireFox and IE.

This function from this answer is the best way to handle this as $.ready explicitly fails for iframes. Here's the decision not to support this.
The load event also doesn't fire if the iframe has already loaded. Very frustrating that this remains a problem in 2020!
function onIframeReady($i, successFn, errorFn) {
try {
const iCon = $i.first()[0].contentWindow,
bl = "about:blank",
compl = "complete";
const callCallback = () => {
try {
const $con = $i.contents();
if($con.length === 0) { // https://git.io/vV8yU
throw new Error("iframe inaccessible");
}
successFn($con);
} catch(e) { // accessing contents failed
errorFn();
}
};
const observeOnload = () => {
$i.on("load.jqueryMark", () => {
try {
const src = $i.attr("src").trim(),
href = iCon.location.href;
if(href !== bl || src === bl || src === "") {
$i.off("load.jqueryMark");
callCallback();
}
} catch(e) {
errorFn();
}
});
};
if(iCon.document.readyState === compl) {
const src = $i.attr("src").trim(),
href = iCon.location.href;
if(href === bl && src !== bl && src !== "") {
observeOnload();
} else {
callCallback();
}
} else {
observeOnload();
}
} catch(e) {
errorFn();
}
}

Basically what others have already posted but IMHO a bit cleaner:
$('<iframe/>', {
src: 'https://example.com/',
load: function() {
alert("loaded")
}
}).appendTo('body');

Try this,
<iframe id="testframe" src="about:blank" onload="if (testframe.location.href != 'about:blank') testframe_loaded()"></iframe>
All you need to do then is create the JavaScript function testframe_loaded().

I'm loading the PDF with jQuery ajax into browser cache. Then I create embedded element with data already in browser cache. I guess it will work with iframe too.
var url = "http://example.com/my.pdf";
// show spinner
$.mobile.showPageLoadingMsg('b', note, false);
$.ajax({
url: url,
cache: true,
mimeType: 'application/pdf',
success: function () {
// display cached data
$(scroller).append('<embed type="application/pdf" src="' + url + '" />');
// hide spinner
$.mobile.hidePageLoadingMsg();
}
});
You have to set your http headers correctly as well.
HttpContext.Response.Expires = 1;
HttpContext.Response.Cache.SetNoServerCaching();
HttpContext.Response.Cache.SetAllowResponseInBrowserHistory(false);
HttpContext.Response.CacheControl = "Private";

This was the exact issue I ran into with our client. I created a little jquery plugin that seems to work for iframe readiness. It uses polling to check the iframe document readyState combined with the inner document url combined with the iframe source to make sure the iframe is in fact "ready".
The issue with "onload" is that you need access to the actual iframe being added to the DOM, if you don't then you need to try to catch the iframe loading which if it is cached then you may not. What I needed was a script that could be called anytime, and determine whether or not the iframe was "ready" or not.
Here's the question:
Holy grail for determining whether or not local iframe has loaded
and here's the jsfiddle I eventually came up with.
https://jsfiddle.net/q0smjkh5/10/
In the jsfiddle above, I am waiting for onload to append an iframe to the dom, then checking iframe's inner document's ready state - which should be cross domain because it's pointed to wikipedia - but Chrome seems to report "complete". The plug-in's iready method then gets called when the iframe is in fact ready. The callback tries to check the inner document's ready state again - this time reporting a cross domain request (which is correct) - anyway it seems to work for what I need and hope it helps others.
<script>
(function($, document, undefined) {
$.fn["iready"] = function(callback) {
var ifr = this.filter("iframe"),
arg = arguments,
src = this,
clc = null, // collection
lng = 50, // length of time to wait between intervals
ivl = -1, // interval id
chk = function(ifr) {
try {
var cnt = ifr.contents(),
doc = cnt[0],
src = ifr.attr("src"),
url = doc.URL;
switch (doc.readyState) {
case "complete":
if (!src || src === "about:blank") {
// we don't care about empty iframes
ifr.data("ready", "true");
} else if (!url || url === "about:blank") {
// empty document still needs loaded
ifr.data("ready", undefined);
} else {
// not an empty iframe and not an empty src
// should be loaded
ifr.data("ready", true);
}
break;
case "interactive":
ifr.data("ready", "true");
break;
case "loading":
default:
// still loading
break;
}
} catch (ignore) {
// as far as we're concerned the iframe is ready
// since we won't be able to access it cross domain
ifr.data("ready", "true");
}
return ifr.data("ready") === "true";
};
if (ifr.length) {
ifr.each(function() {
if (!$(this).data("ready")) {
// add to collection
clc = (clc) ? clc.add($(this)) : $(this);
}
});
if (clc) {
ivl = setInterval(function() {
var rd = true;
clc.each(function() {
if (!$(this).data("ready")) {
if (!chk($(this))) {
rd = false;
}
}
});
if (rd) {
clearInterval(ivl);
clc = null;
callback.apply(src, arg);
}
}, lng);
} else {
clc = null;
callback.apply(src, arg);
}
} else {
clc = null;
callback.apply(this, arguments);
}
return this;
};
}(jQuery, document));
</script>