Generate an HTML stub file linking to the current tab.

GitHub repository here:

https://github.com/nbeaver/save_link_webextension

Hosted on addons.mozilla.org here:

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/save-link-to-current-tab/

• Name: Save a link to the current tab
• Summary: Generates an HTML stub file that links to the current tab.
• Description: This saves a cross-platform link to the current tab as an HTML stub file. The redirect is performed using a meta refresh. It does not save a copy of the current page.

Questions & Answers

What is this for?

Sometimes it's useful to save a link to a webpage as a file that can be copied and moved around. Unfortunately, the defaults are not cross-platform; Linux has Link type desktop files, Microsoft Windows has Internet Shortcuts, and Mac OS X has webloc files. They are all mutually incompatible.

Fortunately, there is an alternative: use an HTML stub file and tell the browser itself to perform the redirect.

https://superuser.com/questions/538089/how-to-create-cross-platform-internet-shortcut-files

How does this work?

It uses the meta tag in an HTML file to perform a client-side redirect.

https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20-TECHS/H76.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta_refresh

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5411538/redirect-from-an-html-page

Has something like this been done already?

Yes, the WebCuts extension appears to do this for Chrome browsers.

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/webcuts/kehckhdcknjaadegmihldoedmdfmpcmk

However, the HTML files generated by WebCuts rely on Javascript to perform the redirect.

Why not use Javascript to change window.location.href?

Not everyone uses a browser with Javascript enabled.

https://www.wired.com/2015/11/i-turned-off-javascript-for-a-whole-week-and-it-was-glorious/

https://blockmetry.com/blog/javascript-disabled

https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2018/05/using-the-web-with-javascript-turned-off/

https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/26179/why-do-people-disable-javascript

What permissions does this extension need, and why?

We need activeTab permissions to access the tab title and URL.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtensions/manifest.json/permissions#activeTab_permission

We need download permissions to download the generated HTML file.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/53474726/generating-html-in-webextension-results-in-this-mdialog-is-null-and-cant-acc/

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons/WebExtensions/API/downloads/download#Examples

Why does this need to be an extension? Why not just use a bookmarklet to generate the HTML file?

Because Content Security Policy (CSP) prevents bookmarklets from running on some pages, such as this one:

https://sourceware.org/gdb/onlinedocs/gdb/index.html

The only workaround is to disable CSP entirely.