Re: [PATCH] org-protocol: Add void() to bookmarklets

[Max Nikulin <manikulin@gmail.com>]

On 22/12/2024 19:42, Ihor Radchenko wrote:
> Max Nikulin writes:
> 
>> -javascript:location.href='org-protocol://store-link?' +
>> -      new URLSearchParams({url:location.href, title:document.title});
>> +javascript:void(location.href='org-protocol://store-link?' +
>> +      new URLSearchParams({url:location.href, title:document.title}));
>>   #+end_example
> 
> Another variant from reddit is
> 
> javascript:location.href='org-protocol://store-link?'+new URLSearchParams({url:location.href, title:document.title}); void(0);

If you think that ";void(0)" variant is less prone to errors then I may 
update my patch. I have no idea if balanced void(...) parenthesis around 
the whole expressions would cause more user mistakes. Otherwise both 
variants are equivalent.

> https://old.reddit.com/r/emacs/comments/1h7ws1i/the_orgprotocol_bookmarklet_opens_a_blank_page/

I can not figure out why it did not work without user's 
~/.local/share/applications/org-protocol.org. The only guess is that 
firefox might be confused by complex Exec entry in emacsclient.desktop. 
So I am curious if /usr/share/applications/emacsclient.desktop has 
org-protocol in MimeType (Emacs >= 29.2) and if a copy of 
emacsclient.desktop in ~/.local/share/application changes behavior in 
the absence of custom org-protocol.desktop.

I have never used bookmarklets, so I am unsure concerning behavior in 
earlier Firefox versions. Unfortunately security-related bugs are 
non-public yet, so I have not idea what has been changed. (I am not 
motivated to search for related commits.)

> Also, will the change work in older browsers? In non-Firefox?

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bookmarklet>
page has a citation that "void" appeared in JavaScript namely for 
bookmarklets and it happened in the previous century.

";undefined" instead of ";void(0)" suffix might be an issue in old 
browsers since "undefined" was added to JS ~10 years ago. I do not 
expect any problem with "void" despite I have used it only in workaround 
for a browser bug.

>> Should ORG-NEWS be updated as well?
> 
> Yes, I think. In announcement section.
> This is one of the cases when we want people to consider changing their
> usual configs.

My idea is to fix existing examples in place, perhaps with a small 
remark on update reason.

Maybe experienced users of bookmarklets are aware of the "void" trick 
and provided examples were enough for them.

I consider the change as a minor fix that does not deserves loud 
announcement, especially taking into account that browsers discourages 
protocol handlers launched on behalf of web pages nowadays.