Develop Reference

Chrome Extension: Modifying a built in function for all webworkers

So here's a bit of background. I need to intercept the return data from a fetch request. I already know how to do that. By injecting this code in the webpage I can read the response body of a fetch. Like this:
var proxyFetch = fetch;
window.fetch = async function () {
var response = proxyFetch(...arguments);
// a lot of other code as well
return response;
}
The problem I'm having is that I can't modify the fetch function for any web workers. I don't have access to their 'this' context. My best bet is something to do with WorkerGlobalScope but I don't know if that object can do what I want.
My second idea was to do something like before the page loads.
window.Worker = class extends window.Worker{
constructor(){
// Take the url they passed into webworker.
// Fetch the url to get the raw javascript.
// Append my javascript to it.
// Turn it into a blob url
// Now I have my javascript running in every web worker
//
// The problem here is that we are not allowed to use asynchronous calls in the constructor.
// I am stumped on this option as well.
}
}
I've looked into WebRequest but they don't allow us to look at the response body of network requests.
I played around with this a lot to see if I could modify the globalThis or WorkerGlobalScope for every webworker on the page so I can modify the fetch but I could not find a way.
var code = "postMessage('hello world');"
var blob = new Blob([code], { type: 'application/javascript' });
var url = URL.createObjectURL(blob);
var worker = new Worker(url);
worker.onmessage = function(e) {
console.log(e.data);
};

What you are trying to achieve is mean to be done by a Service Worker.
They work as proxy between the app and server. You can control whether the request is even made or what it returns.
Additionally you can send messages between your worker and the service worker with the postMessage interface.

How can I load a shared web worker with a user-script?

I want to load a shared worker with a user-script. The problem is the user-script is free, and has no business model for hosting a file - nor would I want to use a server, even a free one, to host one tiny file. Regardless, I tried it and I (of course) get a same origin policy error:
Uncaught SecurityError: Failed to construct 'SharedWorker': Script at
'https://cdn.rawgit.com/viziionary/Nacho-Bot/master/webworker.js'
cannot be accessed from origin 'http://stackoverflow.com'.
There's another way to load a web worker by converting the worker function to a string and then into a Blob and loading that as the worker but I tried that too:
var sharedWorkers = {};
var startSharedWorker = function(workerFunc){
var funcString = workerFunc.toString();
var index = funcString.indexOf('{');
var funcStringClean = funcString.substring(index + 1, funcString.length - 1);
var blob = new Blob([funcStringClean], { type: "text/javascript" });
sharedWorkers.google = new SharedWorker(window.URL.createObjectURL(blob));
sharedWorkers.google.port.start();
};
And that doesn't work either. Why? Because shared workers are shared based on the location their worker file is loaded from. Since createObjectURL generates a unique file name for each use, the workers will never have the same URL and will therefore never be shared.
How can I solve this problem?
Note: I tried asking about specific solutions, but at this point I think
the best I can do is ask in a more broad manner for any
solution to the problem, since all of my attempted solutions seem
fundamentally impossible due to same origin policies or the way
URL.createObjectURL works (from the specs, it seems impossible to
alter the resulting file URL).
That being said, if my question can somehow be improved or clarified, please leave a comment.

You can use fetch(), response.blob() to create an Blob URL of type application/javascript from returned Blob; set SharedWorker() parameter to Blob URL created by URL.createObjectURL(); utilize window.open(), load event of newly opened window to define same SharedWorker previously defined at original window, attach message event to original SharedWorker at newly opened windows.
javascript was tried at console at How to clear the contents of an iFrame from another iFrame, where current Question URL should be loaded at new tab with message from opening window through worker.port.postMessage() event handler logged at console.
Opening window should also log message event when posted from newly opened window using worker.postMessage(/* message */), similarly at opening window
window.worker = void 0, window.so = void 0;
fetch("https://cdn.rawgit.com/viziionary/Nacho-Bot/master/webworker.js")
.then(response => response.blob())
.then(script => {
console.log(script);
var url = URL.createObjectURL(script);
window.worker = new SharedWorker(url);
console.log(worker);
worker.port.addEventListener("message", (e) => console.log(e.data));
worker.port.start();
window.so = window.open("https://stackoverflow.com/questions/"
+ "38810002/"
+ "how-can-i-load-a-shared-web-worker-"
+ "with-a-user-script", "_blank");
so.addEventListener("load", () => {
so.worker = worker;
so.console.log(so.worker);
so.worker.port.addEventListener("message", (e) => so.console.log(e.data));
so.worker.port.start();
so.worker.port.postMessage("hi from " + so.location.href);
});
so.addEventListener("load", () => {
worker.port.postMessage("hello from " + location.href)
})
});
At console at either tab you can then use, e.g.; at How to clear the contents of an iFrame from another iFrame worker.postMessage("hello, again") at new window of current URL How can I load a shared web worker with a user-script?, worker.port.postMessage("hi, again"); where message events attached at each window, communication between the two windows can be achieved using original SharedWorker created at initial URL.

Precondition
As you've researched and as it has been mentioned in comments,
SharedWorker's URL is subject to the Same Origin Policy.
According to this question there's no CORS support for Worker's URL.
According to this issue GM_worker support is now a WONT_FIX, and
seems close enough to impossible to implement due to changes in Firefox.
There's also a note that sandboxed Worker (as opposed to
unsafeWindow.Worker) doesn't work either.
Design
What I suppose you want to achieve is a #include * userscript that will collect some statistics or create some global UI what will appear everywhere. And thus you want to have a worker to maintain some state or statistic aggregates in runtime (which will be easy to access from every instance of user-script), and/or you want to do some computation-heavy routine (because otherwise it will slow target sites down).
In the way of any solution
The solution I want to propose is to replace SharedWorker design with an alternative.
If you want just to maintain a state in the shared worker, just use Greasemonkey storage (GM_setValue and friends). It's shared among all userscript instances (SQLite behide the scenes).
If you want to do something computation-heavy task, to it in unsafeWindow.Worker and put result back in Greasemonkey storage.
If you want to do some background computation and it must be run only by single instance, there are number of "inter-window" synchronisation libraries (mostly they use localStorage but Greasemomkey's has the same API, so it shouldn't be hard to write an adapter to it). Thus you can acquire a lock in one userscript instance and run your routines in it. Like, IWC or ByTheWay (likely used here on Stack Exchange; post about it).
Other way
I'm not sure but there may be some ingenious response spoofing, made from ServiceWorker to make SharedWorker work as you would like to. Starting point is in this answer's edit.

I am pretty sure you want a different answer, but sadly this is what it boils down to.
Browsers implement same-origin-policies to protect internet users, and although your intentions are clean, no legit browser allows you to change the origin of a sharedWorker.
All browsing contexts in a sharedWorker must share the exact same origin
host
protocol
port
You cannot hack around this issue, I've trying using iframes in addition to your methods, but non will work.
Maybe you can put it your javascript file on github and use their raw. service to get the file, this way you can have it running without much efforts.
Update
I was reading chrome updates and I remembered you asking about this.
Cross-origin service workers arrived on chrome!
To do this, add the following to the install event for the SW:
self.addEventListener('install', event => {
event.registerForeignFetch({
scopes: [self.registration.scope], // or some sub-scope
origins: ['*'] // or ['https://example.com']
});
});
Some other considerations are needed aswell, check it out:
Full link: https://developers.google.com/web/updates/2016/09/foreign-fetch?hl=en?utm_campaign=devshow_series_crossoriginserviceworkers_092316&utm_source=gdev&utm_medium=yt-desc

Yes you can! (here's how):
I don't know if it's because something has changed in the four years since this question was asked, but it is entirely possible to do exactly what the question is asking for. It's not even particularly difficult. The trick is to initialize the shared worker from a data-url that contains its code directly, rather than from a createObjectURL(blob).
This is probably most easily demonstrated by example, so here's a little userscript for stackoverflow.com that uses a shared worker to assign each stackoverflow window a unique ID number, displayed in the tab title. Note that the shared-worker code is directly included as a template string (i.e. between backtick quotes):
// ==UserScript==
// #name stackoverflow userscript shared worker example
// #namespace stackoverflow test code
// #version 1.0
// #description Demonstrate the use of shared workers created in userscript
// #icon https://stackoverflow.com/favicon.ico
// #include http*://stackoverflow.com/*
// #run-at document-start
// ==/UserScript==
(function() {
"use strict";
var port = (new SharedWorker('data:text/javascript;base64,' + btoa(
// =======================================================================================================================
// ================================================= shared worker code: =================================================
// =======================================================================================================================
// This very simple shared worker merely provides each window with a unique ID number, to be displayed in the title
`
var lastID = 0;
onconnect = function(e)
{
var port = e.source;
port.onmessage = handleMessage;
port.postMessage(["setID",++lastID]);
}
function handleMessage(e) { console.log("Message Recieved by shared worker: ",e.data); }
`
// =======================================================================================================================
// =======================================================================================================================
))).port;
port.onmessage = function(e)
{
var data = e.data, msg = data[0];
switch (msg)
{
case "setID": document.title = "#"+data[1]+": "+document.title; break;
}
}
})();
I can confirm that this is working on FireFox v79 + Tampermonkey v4.11.6117.
There are a few minor caveats:
Firstly, it might be that the page your userscript is targeting is served with a Content-Security-Policy header that explicitly restricts the sources for scripts or worker scripts (script-src or worker-src policies). In that case, the data-url with your script's content will probably be blocked, and OTOH I can't think of a way around that, unless some future GM_ function gets added to allow a userscript to override a page's CSP or change its HTTP headers, or unless the user runs their browser with an extension or browser settings to disable CSP (see e.g. Disable same origin policy in Chrome).
Secondly, userscripts can be defined to run on multiple domains, e.g. you might run the same userscript on https://amazon.com and https://amazon.co.uk. But even when created by this single userscript, shared workers obey the same-origin policy, so there should be a different instance of the shared worker that gets created for all the .com windows vs for all the .co.uk windows. Be aware of this!
Finally, some browsers may impose a size limit on how long data-urls can be, restricting the maximum length of code for the shared worker. Even if not restricted, the conversion of all the code for long, complicated shared worker to base64 and back on every window load is quite inefficient. As is the indexing of shared workers by extremely long URLs (since you connect to an existing shared worker based on matching its exact URL). So what you can do is (a) start with an initially very minimal shared worker, then use eval() to add the real (potentially much longer) code to it, in response to something like an "InitWorkerRequired" message passed to the first window that opens the worker, and (b) For added efficiency, pre-calculate the base-64 string containing the initial minimal shared-worker bootstrap code.
Here's a modified version of the above example with these two wrinkles added in (also tested and confirmed to work), that runs on both stackoverflow.com and en.wikipedia.org (just so you can verify that the different domains do indeed use separate shared worker instances):
// ==UserScript==
// #name stackoverflow & wikipedia userscript shared worker example
// #namespace stackoverflow test code
// #version 2.0
// #description Demonstrate the use of shared workers created in userscript, with code injection after creation
// #icon https://stackoverflow.com/favicon.ico
// #include http*://stackoverflow.com/*
// #include http*://en.wikipedia.org/*
// #run-at document-end
// ==/UserScript==
(function() {
"use strict";
// Minimal bootstrap code used to first create a shared worker (commented out because we actually use a pre-encoded base64 string created from a minified version of this code):
/*
// ==================================================================================================================================
{
let x = [];
onconnect = function(e)
{
var p = e.source;
x.push(e);
p.postMessage(["InitWorkerRequired"]);
p.onmessage = function(e) // Expects only 1 kind of message: the init code. So we don't actually check for any other sort of message, and page script therefore mustn't send any other sort of message until init has been confirmed.
{
(0,eval)(e.data[1]); // (0,eval) is an indirect call to eval(), which therefore executes in global scope (rather than the scope of this function). See http://perfectionkills.com/global-eval-what-are-the-options/ or https://stackoverflow.com/questions/19357978/indirect-eval-call-in-strict-mode
while(e = x.shift()) onconnect(e); // This calls the NEW onconnect function, that the eval() above just (re-)defined. Note that unless windows are opened in very quick succession, x should only have one entry.
}
}
}
// ==================================================================================================================================
*/
// Actual code that we want the shared worker to execute. Can be as long as we like!
// Note that it must replace the onconnect handler defined by the minimal bootstrap worker code.
var workerCode =
// ==================================================================================================================================
`
"use strict"; // NOTE: because this code is evaluated by eval(), the presence of "use strict"; here will cause it to be evaluated in it's own scope just below the global scope, instead of in the global scope directly. Practically this shouldn't matter, though: it's rather like enclosing the whole code in (function(){...})();
var lastID = 0;
onconnect = function(e) // MUST set onconnect here; bootstrap method relies on this!
{
var port = e.source;
port.onmessage = handleMessage;
port.postMessage(["WorkerConnected",++lastID]); // As well as providing a page with it's ID, the "WorkerConnected" message indicates to a page that the worker has been initialized, so it may be posted messages other than "InitializeWorkerCode"
}
function handleMessage(e)
{
var data = e.data;
if (data[0]==="InitializeWorkerCode") return; // If two (or more) windows are opened very quickly, "InitWorkerRequired" may get posted to BOTH, and the second response will then arrive at an already-initialized worker, so must check for and ignore it here.
// ...
console.log("Message Received by shared worker: ",e.data); // For this simple example worker, there's actually nothing to do here
}
`;
// ==================================================================================================================================
// Use a base64 string encoding minified version of the minimal bootstrap code in the comments above, i.e.
// btoa('{let x=[];onconnect=function(e){var p=e.source;x.push(e);p.postMessage(["InitWorkerRequired"]);p.onmessage=function(e){(0,eval)(e.data[1]);while(e=x.shift()) onconnect(e);}}}');
// NOTE: If there's any chance the page might be using more than one shared worker based on this "bootstrap" method, insert a comment with some identification or name for the worker into the minified, base64 code, so that different shared workers get unique data-URLs (and hence don't incorrectly share worker instances).
var port = (new SharedWorker('data:text/javascript;base64,e2xldCB4PVtdO29uY29ubmVjdD1mdW5jdGlvbihlKXt2YXIgcD1lLnNvdXJjZTt4LnB1c2goZSk7cC5wb3N0TWVzc2FnZShbIkluaXRXb3JrZXJSZXF1aXJlZCJdKTtwLm9ubWVzc2FnZT1mdW5jdGlvbihlKXsoMCxldmFsKShlLmRhdGFbMV0pO3doaWxlKGU9eC5zaGlmdCgpKSBvbmNvbm5lY3QoZSk7fX19')).port;
port.onmessage = function(e)
{
var data = e.data, msg = data[0];
switch (msg)
{
case "WorkerConnected": document.title = "#"+data[1]+": "+document.title; break;
case "InitWorkerRequired": port.postMessage(["InitializeWorkerCode",workerCode]); break;
}
}
})();

How to make JS wait until protocol execution finished

I have a custom URL protocol handler cgit:[...]
It launches up a background process which configures some stuff on the local machine. The protocol works fine, i'm launching it from JavaScript (currently using document.location = 'cgit:[...]'), but i actually want JavaScript to wait until the associated program exits.
So basically the steps i want JavaScript to do:
JavaScript does something
JavaScript launches cgit:[...]
Javascript waits until cgit:[...] exits
JavaScript does something else
Code:
function launchCgit(params)
{
showProgressBar();
document.location="cgit:"+params;
document.addEventListener( /* CGit-Program exited event */, hideProgressBar );
}
or:
function launchCgit(params)
{
showProgressBar();
// setLocationAndWait("cgit:"+params);
hideProgressBar();
}
Any ideas if this is possible?

Since this isn't really an expected use of window.location I would doubt that there's an easy way. My recommendation would be to use an AJAX request and have the c++ program send a response when it's done. That way, whatever code needs to run after the c++ program can be run when the request completes.

As i didn't find a suitable way to solve my problem using ajax requests or anything similar, i finally solved my problem using a kind-of-ugly workarround including XmlHttpRequest
For launching the protocol i'm still using document.location=cgit:[...]
I'm using a server side system including "lock-files" - that's like generic dummy files, with generated names for each request.
Once the user requests to open the custom protocol, such a file is being generated on the server specifically for that one protocol-opening-request.
I created a folder called "$locks" on the server where these files are being placed in. Once the protocol-associated program exits, the appropriate file is being deleted.
The website continuously checks if the file for a request still exists using XmlHttpRequest and fires a callback if it doesn't (example timout between tests: 1 sec).
The structure of the new files is the following:
lockThisRequest.php: It creates a file in the $locks directory based on the req url-parameter.
unlockThisRequest.php: It deletes a file in the $locks directory; again based on the req url-parameter.
The JavaScript part of it goes:
function launchCgit(params,callback)
{
var lock = /* Generate valid filename from params variable */;
// "Lock" that Request (means: telling the server that a request with this ID is now in use)
var locker = new XmlHttpRequest();
locker.open('GET', 'lockThisRequest.php?req='+lock, true)
locker.send(null);
function retry()
{
// Test if the lock-file still exists on the server
var req = new XmlHttpRequest();
req.open('GET', '$locks/'+lock, true);
req.onReadyStateChanged=function()
{
if (req.readyState == 4)
{
if (req.status == 200)
{
// lock-file exists -> cgit has not exited yet
window.setTimeout(retry,1000);
}
else if (req.status == 404)
{
// lock-file not found -> request has been proceeded
callback();
}
}
}
req.send(null);
}
document.location = 'cgit:'+params; // execute custom protocol
retry(); // initialize lockfileCheck-loop
}
Ussage is:
launchCgit("doThisAndThat",function()
{
alert("ThisAndThat finished.");
});
the lockThisRequest.php-file:
<?php
file_put_contents("$locks/".$_GET["req"],""); // Create lock file
?>
and unlockThisRequest.php:
<?php
unlink("../\$locks/".$_GET["req"]); // Delete lock file
?>
The local program / script executed by the protocol can simply call something like:
#!/bin/bash
curl "http://servername/unlockThisRequest.php?req=$1"
after it finished.
As i just said this works, but it's anything else than nice (congratulations if you kept track of those instructions)
I'd rather prefered a more simple way and (important) this also may cause security issues with the lockThisRequest.php and unlockThisRequest.php files!
I'm fine with this solution, because i'm only using it on a password protected private page. But if you plan to use it on a public or non protected page, you may want to add some security to the php files.
Anyways, the solution works for me now, but if anyone finds a better way to do it - for example by using ajax requests - he/she would be very welcome to add that way to the respective stackoverflow-documentation or the like and post a link to it on this thread. I'd still be interested in alternative solutions :)

How to check if the user is online using javascript or any library?

I need some help on how I could check the internet connection using Javascript or jQuery or any library if available. cause i'm developing an offline application and I want to show a version if the user is offline and another version if the user is online.
For the moment i'm using this code :
if (navigator.onLine) {
alert('online');
} else {
alert('offline');
}
But this is working very slow to detect. sometimes it's just connected to a network without internet, it takes 5 to 10 seconds to alert false (No internet).
I took a look at Offline.js library, but I'm not sure if this library is useful in my case. and I don't know how to use it

I just got this bit of code functionality from a Mozilla Site:
window.addEventListener('load', function(e) {
if (navigator.onLine) {
console.log('We\'re online!');
} else {
console.log('We\'re offline...');
}
}, false);
window.addEventListener('online', function(e) {
console.log('And we\'re back :).');
}, false);
window.addEventListener('offline', function(e) {
console.log('Connection is down.');
}, false);
They even have a link to see it working. I tried it in IE, Firefox and Chrome. Chrome appeared the slowest but it was only about half a second.

i think you should try OFFLINE.js.. it looks pretty easy to use, just give it a try.
it even provides the option checkOnLoad which checks the connection immediately on page load.
Offline.check(): Check the current status of the connection.
Offline.state: The current state of the connection 'up' or 'down'
haven't tried it, would be nice to know if it works as intended.
EDIT took a little peak into the code, it uses the method with FAILED XHR REQUEST suggested in THIS SO Question

Take a look at Detect that the Internet connection is offline? Basically, make an ajax request to something you know is likely to be up (say google.com) and if it fails, there is no internet connection.

navigator.onLine is a property that maintains a true/false value (true for online, false for offline). This property is updated whenever the user switches into "Offline Mode".
window.addEventListener('load', function() {
function updateOnlineStatus(event) {
document.body.setAttribute("data-online", navigator.onLine);
}
updateOnlineStatus();
window.addEventListener('online', updateOnlineStatus);
window.addEventListener('offline', updateOnlineStatus);
});

// check if online/offline
// http://www.kirupa.com/html5/check_if_internet_connection_exists_in_javascript.htm
function doesConnectionExist() {
var xhr = new XMLHttpRequest();
var file = "http://www.yoursite.com/somefile.png";
var randomNum = Math.round(Math.random() * 10000);
xhr.open('HEAD', file + "?rand=" + randomNum, false);
try {
xhr.send();
if (xhr.status >= 200 && xhr.status < 304) {
return true;
} else {
return false;
}
} catch (e) {
return false;
}
}

My solution is to grab a very small image (1x1), not cached and always onLine.
<head>
<script src="jquery.min.js"></script>
</head>
<body>
<script>
$( document ).ready(function() {
function onLine() {
alert("onLine")
}
function offLine() {
alert("offLine")
}
var i = new Image();
i.onload = onLine;
i.onerror = offLine;
i.src = 'http://www.google-analytics.com/__utm.gif';
});
</script>
<body>
Notes:
Use a local copy of jQuery otherwise it won't work offLine.
I've tested the code onLine/offLine and it works without delay.
Works with all browsers, Desktop or Mobile.
In case you wonder, there's no tracking made from Google Analytics as we don't use any arguments.
Feel free to change the image, just make sure it doesn't get cached and it's small in size.

Try utilizing WebRTC , see diafygi/webrtc-ips; in part
Additionally, these STUN requests are made outside of the normal
XMLHttpRequest procedure, so they are not visible in the developer
console or able to be blocked by plugins such as AdBlockPlus or
Ghostery. This makes these types of requests available for online
tracking if an advertiser sets up a STUN server with a wildcard
domain.
modified minimally to log "online" or "offline" at console
// https://github.com/diafygi/webrtc-ips
function online(callback){
//compatibility for firefox and chrome
var RTCPeerConnection = window.RTCPeerConnection
|| window.mozRTCPeerConnection
|| window.webkitRTCPeerConnection;
var useWebKit = !!window.webkitRTCPeerConnection;
//bypass naive webrtc blocking using an iframe
if(!RTCPeerConnection) {
//NOTE: you need to have an iframe in the page
// right above the script tag
//
//<iframe id="iframe" sandbox="allow-same-origin" style="display: none"></iframe>
//<script>...getIPs called in here...
//
var win = iframe.contentWindow;
RTCPeerConnection = win.RTCPeerConnection
|| win.mozRTCPeerConnection
|| win.webkitRTCPeerConnection;
useWebKit = !!win.webkitRTCPeerConnection;
}
//minimal requirements for data connection
var mediaConstraints = {
optional: [{RtpDataChannels: true}]
};
//firefox already has a default stun server in about:config
// media.peerconnection.default_iceservers =
// [{"url": "stun:stun.services.mozilla.com"}]
var servers = undefined;
//add same stun server for chrome
if(useWebKit)
servers = {iceServers: [{urls: "stun:stun.services.mozilla.com"}]};
//construct a new RTCPeerConnection
var pc = new RTCPeerConnection(servers, mediaConstraints);
//create a bogus data channel
pc.createDataChannel("");
var fn = function() {};
//create an offer sdp
pc.createOffer(function(result){
//trigger the stun server request
pc.setLocalDescription(result, fn, fn);
}, fn);
//wait for a while to let everything done
setTimeout(function(){
//read candidate info from local description
var lines = pc.localDescription.sdp.split("\n");
// return `true`:"online" , or `false`:"offline"
var res = lines.some(function(line) {
return line.indexOf("a=candidate") === 0
});
callback(res);
}, 500);
}
//Test: Print "online" or "offline" into the console
online(function(connection) {
if (connection) {
console.log("online")
} else {
console.log("offline")
}
});

You can use SignalR, if you're developing using MS web technologies. SignalR will establish either long polling or web sockets depending on your server/client browser technology, transparent to you the developer. You don't need to use it for anything else than determining if you have an active connection to the site or not.
If SignalR disconnects for any reason, then you have lost connection to the site, as long as your SignalR server instance is actually installed on the site. Thus, you can use $.connection.hub.disconnected() event/method on the client to set a global var which holds your connection status.
Read up about SignalR and how to use it for determining connection states here...
http://www.asp.net/signalr/overview/guide-to-the-api/handling-connection-lifetime-events#clientdisconnect

See How do I check connection type (WiFi/LAN/WWAN) using HTML5/JavaScript? answers:
Rob W suggests navigator.connection;
Bergi suggests Windows.Networking.Connectivity API through this tutorial;
Gerard Sexton suggests Gmail approach.

You can use the new Fetch API which will trigger an error almost immediately if no network is present.
The problem with this is that the Fetch API has infant support at the moment (currently Chrome has the most stable implementation, Firefox and Opera is getting there, IE does not support it). There exists a polyfill to support the fetch principle but not necessarily the rapid return as with a pure implementation. On the other hand, an offline app would require a modern browser...
An example which will try to load a plain text file over HTTPS to avoid CORS requirements (link is picked at random, you should set up a server with a tiny text file to test against - test in Chrome, for now):
fetch("https://link.to/some/testfile")
.then(function(response) {
if (response.status !== 200) { // add more checks here, ie. 30x etc.
alert("Not available"); // could be server errors
}
else
alert("OK");
})
.catch(function(err) {
alert("No network"); // likely network errors (incl. no connection)
});
Another option is to set up a Service worker and use fetch from there. This way you could serve an optional/custom offline page or a cached page when the requested page is not available. Also this is a very fresh API.

best one liner
console.log(navigator.onLine ? 'online' : 'offline');

Intercept new downloads in Firefox Addon SDK

I have written a simple download manager for Windows and I would like to create an addon for Firefox that when enabled intercepts new downloads in Firefox and sends them to the download manager.
I have already done this for Google Chrome using:
chrome.downloads.onCreated.addListener(function(details) {
// stop the download
chrome.downloads.cancel(details.id, null);
}
The question is how can I achieve something similar using the Firefox add-on SDK.
I see there is a way of intercepting page loads to view the content / headers which might be helpful but then I won't know if the request will turn into a download or not.
Firefox add-on SDK: Get http response headers
I could perhaps look for a content type that is not text/html or check for a content disposition header but that could cause problems if I don't correctly handle all cases.
Is there no way of accessing the download manager using the JS SDK or some way of knowing when a download has been started / being started and stop it?

The http-on-examine-response observer that the linked question discusses is the wrong way to go. It concerns all requests not just downloads.
Instead use the Downloads.jsm to observe new downloads, then cancel them, and so on.
To load Downloads.jsm in the SDK use:
const {Cu} = require("chrome");
Cu.import("resource://gre/modules/Downloads.jsm");
Cu.import("resource://gre/modules/Task.jsm");
Then you can add your listener.
let view = {
onDownloadAdded: function(download) {
console.log("Added", download);
},
onDownloadChanged: function(download) {
console.log("Changed", download);
},
onDownloadRemoved: function(download) {
console.log("Removed", download);
}
};
Task.spawn(function() {
try {
let list = yield Downloads.getList(Downloads.ALL);
yield list.addView(view);
} catch (ex) {
console.error(ex);
}
});
The linked MDN docs have more information and samples.
Since your add-on is a restartless SDK add-on, you'll need to remove the listener again using .removeView on unload, or else there will be a memory leak.

Here's the JSM way.
Components.utils.import("resource://gre/modules/Downloads.jsm");
Components.utils.import("resource://gre/modules/Task.jsm");
Components.utils.import("resource://gre/modules/FileUtils.jsm");
var view = {
onDownloadChanged: function (download) {
console.log(download, 'Changed');
if (download.succeeded) {
var file = new FileUtils.File(this.target.path);
console.log('file', file);
}
}
};
var list;
Task.spawn(function () {
list = yield Downloads.getList(Downloads.ALL);
list.addView(view);
}).then(null, Components.utils.reportError);
Remember to removeView to stop listening. Can do this anywhere, like in shutdown function or whatever, doesn't have to be within that Task.spawn so list must be global var.
list.removeView(view); //to stop listening
Here's the old way, which seems to still work. Although I thought they said they're going to take out the old downloadManager:
var observerService = Components.classes["#mozilla.org/download-manager;1"].getService(Components.interfaces.nsIDownloadManager);
observerService.addListener({
onDownloadStateChange: function (state, dl) {
console.log('dl=', dl);
console.log('state=', state);
console.log('targetFile', dl.targetFile);
if (state == 7 && dl.targetFile.leafName.substr(-4) == ".txt") {
//guys just downloaded (succesfully) a .txt file
}
}
});
Heres a mozillazine with some more on this: http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=2792021