I'm trying to develop import feature for my chrome extension, but this task seems more difficult then expected.
Actually my idea is to use an
<input type="file" id="myInput">
TO load the file and then add a change listener on that element:
element.addEventListener('change', function(evt){
read_single_file(evt,tab);
}
Now there are several problem that i'm facing:
- The first problem is that the popup is closed when the open dialog opens, and it causes all related object and code to be destroyed with the popup page. And looking at other question, this is the normal behaviour of a chrome extension, when it lost focus the popup will be destroyed.
I found another solution, that suggests to add the file logic into the background page, that will not be destroyed if the popup lost focus. Then i added this function in background:
file_import = function(element, tab) {
element.addEventListener('change', function(evt){
read_single_file(evt,tab);
}, false);
element.click();
console.log("uffa");
}
And then i updated my popup.js to call the background method:
get_current_tab(function(tab){
var BGPage = chrome.extension.getBackgroundPage();
BGPage.file_import(document.getElementById('myInput'), tab);
});
And in that way the file_import is called by popup, it adds the change listener to myInput element, and opens up the File Open dialog but... opening the file dialog the popup is gone, and everything related to it, then... same problem again.
So i decided to try to create a new input file element in background page, and trigger click event from it, but obviously it doesn't work.
So, I'm stuck here, with no good ideas on how to solve that problem. Or at least i have few in my mind, but i don't know if they work, or they are just workaround.
- One of them is to move the import feature into the devtools area (since it is an extension useful for developer it makes sense), where I hope that the open file dialog, doesn't cause to my extension to be destroyed.
- Or another maybe could be to move the import file logic into an external page that opens a new tab and import the values from the files. In that case, since what I need only to access, except the file content is the current tab URL, maybe I don't have to use Google Chrome API.
- The third idea is to inject an html element into the current page, and then access it from the extension adding the listener directly to that element, and in that case i don't think that my listener is destroyed if the popup is destroyed (the page will be reloaded just after the import, so my hidden input will stay just for the time needed for the operation).
To sum up my questions are:
- There is a clean way to read file content inside a chrome extension, without the need to use external files, open new tabs, etc (if possible i prefer to keep everything inside the extension)?
- If no is possible to prepopulate a new tab with a JavaScript file?
- Can i add a listener to DOM elements inside the current page?
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