CODEWITHSUNDEEP
javascriptfirefoxfirefox-addon-webextensions
Miraj50
Miraj50

Reputation: 4407

tabs.saveAsPDF() not working (Firefox Web-ext)

So, I got Firefox 56 (Ubuntu Gnome) yesterday and I started experimenting with tabs.saveAsPDF() function (Firefox 56+). So on the site the example that they have shown is for a background script. But I want to trigger it only when I press a button. So I made a button, and wrote this code in the .js file (a popup).

var savepdf = document.querySelector('.savePDF');
savepdf.addEventListener('click', saveaspdf);

function saveaspdf(){
console.log('Inside saveaspdf'); //for checking
browser.tabs.saveAsPDF({footerCenter:"hello",footerLeft:"2",footerRight:"4/10/2017",headerCenter:"Mera Baba",headerLeft:"Baba",headerRight:"Baba",marginBottom:0.5,marginLeft:0.5,marginRight:0.5,marginTop:0.5,orientation:0,paperHeight:11.0,paperSizeUnit:0,paperWidth:8.5,scaling:1,showBackgroundColors:false,showBackgroundImages:false,shrinkToFit:true})
    .then((status) => {
        console.log(status);
    });
}

When I click the button, the window for saving it as pdf comes(say I select Desktop), and I hit save. Nothing happens(the downloads addon also doesn't turn blue) and a corrupted pdf file is saved to my desktop. The console looks like this :

result

So, it goes inside the function but then (I don't have much idea) "Cannot send function call result..." happens. Please help me regarding how to solve this.

This is my manifest.json file :

"permissions": [
      "storage",
      "<all_urls>",
      "tabs",
      "activeTab"
    ],

    "browser_action": {
      "default_icon": "icons/pdf.ico",
      "default_title": "My pdf",
      "default_popup": "popup/addsite.html"
    }

EDIT :-

I made a very simple extension consisting of only a background.js file and copied the code from this site. Still then the only page where the function seems to work is the about:debugging page of Firefox. So I don't understand what am I missing here?!

Upvotes: 1

Views: 494

Answers (1)

Smile4ever
Smile4ever

Reputation: 3704

browser.tabs.saveAsPDF will only work in the background script. You will need messaging between your content script and your background script.

So contentscript.js:

var savepdf = document.querySelector('.savePDF');
savepdf.addEventListener('click', saveaspdf);

function saveaspdf(){
  console.log('Inside saveaspdf'); //for checking
  browser.runtime.sendMessage("saveCurrentPageAsUrl");
}

background.js:

browser.runtime.onMessage.addListener(onMessage);

function onMessage(message) {
  if(message == "saveCurrentPageAsUrl"){
    saveCurrentPageAsUrl();
  }
}

function saveCurrentPageAsUrl(){
  browser.tabs.saveAsPDF({footerCenter:"hello",footerLeft:"2",footerRight:"4/10/2017",headerCenter:"Mera Baba",headerLeft:"Baba",headerRight:"Baba",marginBottom:0.5,marginLeft:0.5,marginRight:0.5,marginTop:0.5,orientation:0,paperHeight:11.0,paperSizeUnit:0,paperWidth:8.5,scaling:1,showBackgroundColors:false,showBackgroundImages:false,shrinkToFit:true})
      .then((status) => {
          console.log(status);
      });
  }

}

A bug (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1404681) affecting Firefox 57 and Firefox 58 is currently preventing most pages from being saved as PDF, therefore a check should be built into the addon using getBrowserInfo (https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/runtime/getBrowserInfo) to display a notification to the user when it's not supported (https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/notifications).

Upvotes: 2

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