Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

[Andreas Burtzlaff]

Hello all,

I am developing a Firefox extension for interaction with org-mode that
goes by the name "Fireforg".

It shows the number of occurrences of the currently viewed url in
the agenda files as well as the associated tags in the status bar.
A left click on the status bar entry displays a popup menu, where all
associated headings are shown and a click on one of them lets emacs
visit it.

Furthermore, it alters the style of links that occur in the agenda files
when viewing a website. Their tooltip is set to contain the associated
headers.

A right click on the status bar entry lets the user choose
from predefined actions, currently org-protocol's "store-link" and
"remember".

Although the functionality mentioned above is usable, the code should
still be considered experimental, so don't expect anything and backup
your data. This is not a release but rather a call for testing and
ideas.

* Try it out
To try it out you need to have org-protocol installed as described here:
http://orgmode.org/worg/org-contrib/org-protocol.php

Download org-registry.el and org-fireforg.el from the lisp directory in the
repository: http://repo.or.cz/w/org-fireforg.git

(org-registry.el is supposed to replace the contributed package, but is
still lacking some of its functions (see section below)).
Put the two files in the load-path and initialize by evaluating:

(require 'org-registry) ;; Be sure the downloaded file is used here, not the one in contrib
(org-registry-insinuate)
(require 'org-fireforg)
;; When putting the following into .emacs it might fail, if 
;; org-agenda-files has not been initialized yet.
(org-registry-initialize t) 

Finally, click on the file build/fireforg.xpi in the latest tree in the
repository at: http://repo.or.cz/w/org-fireforg.git
confirm the installation of the extension and reload firefox.

(Windows users might have to adjust: org-registry-file-xml  in Emacs
and "registry-file" in Fireforgs preferences.)

* Ideas/Discussion

- Add an optional search string to external links, so that
individual text passages in a website can be referenced and highlighted
in the site itself when it is revisited.

- Show a bookmark tree in firefox that is generated from the header
structure of an org file/a set of org files by filtering those with
url's in them. Together with store-link this would completely replace
firefox's bookmark functionality.
The tree could be shown either using menu popups or better as html
rendered using org's publishing capabilities. As I have no experience
with the later, could someone write such a function?

- Weaker url matching criteria. Match all parent urls, ...

- The registry is currently only updated for files in the agenda to
prevent pollution from temporary org files, possibly containing
org-fstrees. Maybe we could extend the set with
org-agenda-text-search-extra-files? Or rather make it customizable on
its own?

- I hope no one takes offence at the rewrite of org-registry without
renaming or prior discussion. I'd like to add the missing functions, but
can't get org-registry-show to work in Bastien's original version.

- Is the use of the org logo ok for the purpose of the extension?

- The logo and name are also subject to discussion. I'm still wondering
what crossbreeding a firefox and a green unicorn would yield...

* How it works
The rewritten org-registry generates an xml file (customizable through
org-registry-file-xml) that is read and searched by the extension.
An org-protocol subprotocol is used to let emacs visit an occurence.

I also have almost finished code that uses a temporary file to pass
response data from emacs to the extension. Kind of Emacs as a database
server... (probably existed though).

Hope you enjoy it,

Andreas

Re: Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

[Daniel Martins]

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As I am not a developer I cannot be 100% certain but I feel that there are
standardized paths for
emacs and firefox that work across distributions.

Maybe someone from the list could give us some hint.

Daniel

2009/8/7 Andreas Burtzlaff <andy13@gmx.net>

> Hi,
>
> On Fri, 7 Aug 2009 09:00:53 -0300
> Daniel Martins <danielemc@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Amaziing and quite useful work!!!
>
> Thanks Daniel.
>
> > It would be interesting to have a package .deb/.rpm  to install the whole
> > bundle.
> >
> > More people would install and be a beta tester.
>
> Yes, the installation is messy, because the proper integration with
> existing code is also a matter of discussion, especially the rewrite of
> org-registry.
> Preparing packages is a good idea, but as a Gentoo user I have no
> experience with rpm/deb packages; are there standardized paths for
> emacs and firefox that work across distributions? In that case I might
> give it a try.
>
> Andreas
>

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Re: Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

[Daniel Martins]

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I followed your indications but it did not work properly.

1. My org-agenda-files became nil I dont know the reason

2. The plugin was properly installed in firefox but it did not talk
propoerly with emacsclient. Nothing happens on emacs.

I dont know how to make a few tests to verify what happened


Daniel

2009/8/7 Daniel Martins <danielemc@gmail.com>

> As I am not a developer I cannot be 100% certain but I feel that there are
> standardized paths for
> emacs and firefox that work across distributions.
>
> Maybe someone from the list could give us some hint.
>
> Daniel
>
> 2009/8/7 Andreas Burtzlaff <andy13@gmx.net>
>
>> Hi,
>>
>>
>> On Fri, 7 Aug 2009 09:00:53 -0300
>> Daniel Martins <danielemc@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> > Amaziing and quite useful work!!!
>>
>> Thanks Daniel.
>>
>> > It would be interesting to have a package .deb/.rpm  to install the
>> whole
>> > bundle.
>> >
>> > More people would install and be a beta tester.
>>
>> Yes, the installation is messy, because the proper integration with
>> existing code is also a matter of discussion, especially the rewrite of
>> org-registry.
>> Preparing packages is a good idea, but as a Gentoo user I have no
>> experience with rpm/deb packages; are there standardized paths for
>> emacs and firefox that work across distributions? In that case I might
>> give it a try.
>>
>> Andreas
>>
>
>

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Re: Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

[Andreas Burtzlaff]

On Sat, 8 Aug 2009 14:19:35 -0300
Daniel Martins <danielemc@gmail.com> wrote:

> I followed your indications but it did not work properly.
> 
> 1. My org-agenda-files became nil I dont know the reason

org-agenda-files is not altered in my code.
I made a small mistake in the original posting and am changing the
installation now anyway, but for the time being:
Do you mean the debug message:
"org-registry-initialize: org-agenda-files = nil"
and did you put the lisp code into .emacs?
In that case make
(org-registry-initialize t)
the very _last_ line in your .emacs .
I'll put a page on Worg soon...
My apologies for the inconvenience.
By the way, these kind of emacs configuration issues are a reason why
packaging is a bit problematic, at least at this stage of development.

> 
> 2. The plugin was properly installed in firefox but it did not talk
> propoerly with emacsclient. Nothing happens on emacs.

What exactly did you try?
Your issue 1. prevents the url lookup to work, so I'd only expect
"store-link" and "remember" to work anyway. (right click on the statusbar entry)

Does org-protocol itself work with the bookmarks described in its
manual?

Generally, error messages in firefox are shown in Tools->Error Console:
Look for errors containing: "chrome://fireforg/" , and send them to me
(privately, not through the list, perhaps).

Thanks for your help and patience in testing

Andreas

Re: Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

[Daniel Martins]

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The issue on org-agenda-files was solved. It was my mistake, sorry.

The firefox plugin:

(right click on the statusbar entry) : works in a limited sense. It pops up
the remember and store-links options but nothing happens when I left-click
on both fields.

(left click on the statusbar entry) : does absolutely nothing.

Daniel

2009/8/8 Andreas Burtzlaff <andy13@gmx.net>

> On Sat, 8 Aug 2009 14:19:35 -0300
> Daniel Martins <danielemc@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I followed your indications but it did not work properly.
> >
> > 1. My org-agenda-files became nil I dont know the reason
>
> org-agenda-files is not altered in my code.
> I made a small mistake in the original posting and am changing the
> installation now anyway, but for the time being:
> Do you mean the debug message:
> "org-registry-initialize: org-agenda-files = nil"
> and did you put the lisp code into .emacs?
> In that case make
> (org-registry-initialize t)
> the very _last_ line in your .emacs .
> I'll put a page on Worg soon...
> My apologies for the inconvenience.
> By the way, these kind of emacs configuration issues are a reason why
> packaging is a bit problematic, at least at this stage of development.
>
> >
> > 2. The plugin was properly installed in firefox but it did not talk
> > propoerly with emacsclient. Nothing happens on emacs.
>
> What exactly did you try?
> Your issue 1. prevents the url lookup to work, so I'd only expect
> "store-link" and "remember" to work anyway. (right click on the statusbar
> entry)
>
> Does org-protocol itself work with the bookmarks described in its
> manual?
>
> Generally, error messages in firefox are shown in Tools->Error Console:
> Look for errors containing: "chrome://fireforg/" , and send them to me
> (privately, not through the list, perhaps).
>
> Thanks for your help and patience in testing
>
> Andreas
>

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Re: Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction

[Andreas Burtzlaff]

On Sat, 8 Aug 2009 17:09:35 -0300
Daniel Martins <danielemc@gmail.com> wrote:

> The issue on org-agenda-files was solved. It was my mistake, sorry.

No problem
 
> (right click on the statusbar entry) : works in a limited sense. It pops up
> the remember and store-links options but nothing happens when I left-click
> on both fields.

Does org-protocol itself work with the bookmarks described in its
manual? If yes, are there any error messages in Tools->Error console in
Firefox containing: "chrome://fireforg/" ?

> (left click on the statusbar entry) : does absolutely nothing.
> 

It will only show something, if the currently viewed url is found in
the agenda files.

To make a test case put:

* Greatest tool in the world [[http://orgmode.org/][Org mode]]    :Org:

in one of your agenda files, save it and visit http://orgmode.org/ with
firefox.

Checklist:
1. Does the file ~/.org-registry.xml exist ? If not, look in *Messages*
   buffer in emacs and send me the last bit.
2. Does it contain orgmode.org? (grep "orgmode.org" ~/.org-registry.xml )
3. Does the statusbar entry show anything, e.g.:
   (1) :Org:
   If not, send me the error messages in firefox as described above.
4. Does the left click work now?

Thanks for the testing

Andreas

Re: Fireforg, a Firefox extension for Org mode interaction (Moved to Worg)

[Andreas Burtzlaff]

Up to date documentation of Fireforg now resides on Worg:

http://orgmode.org/worg/org-devel.php#fireforg

Please only use the installation procedures described there from now on.

Andreas