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digitalmars.D - plugins for Firefox or Thunderbird in D?

reply Marcio <mqmnews321 sglebs.com> writes:
Hi,

	Has anybody tried writing either Firefox or Thunderbird plugins in D? 
Having to use C++ is just a no-no.

	I know one can use JavaScript for plugins, but I think the 
possibilities are different from using C++. So, ideally I'd like the 
full extension API available, but use D.

	Thanks,

marcio
Nov 15 2006
next sibling parent John Demme <me teqdruid.com> writes:
Marcio wrote:


 Hi,
 
 Has anybody tried writing either Firefox or Thunderbird plugins in D?
 Having to use C++ is just a no-no.
 
 I know one can use JavaScript for plugins, but I think the
 possibilities are different from using C++. So, ideally I'd like the
 full extension API available, but use D.
 
 Thanks,
 
 marcio


I haven't done this, but I have looked into it, and I have some experience
with writing FF extensions in JS (it sucks.)  Mozilla does everything-
literally everything- with XPCOM.  XPCOM is natively C++, but other
languages like Python, Java, and JS have ports of it.  Unfortunately, you
can't just use C.

The first step to using D would be getting an XPCOM interface in D.  I had
considered using BCD to wrap the C++ interface.  You might also look at how
Java does it.

Once you've got the XPCOM interface working, your D program should be able
to talk to all the other components in Mozilla, so you're mostly done.  You
just need to figure out how to get Mozilla to load some D code.  I don't
know how this is done in Windows, but I think in Linux, Mozilla will load
shared objects, which DMD still can't generate (AFAIK.)

If you get it working, let me know!  Good luck.

-- 
~John Demme
me teqdruid.com
http://www.teqdruid.com/
Nov 15 2006
prev sibling parent reply BLS <Killing_Zoe web.de> writes:
Sorry, I am not able to supply you with dedicated info. but probablely a 
guy named bobef has some code ... Have a look at D Links ->
AKIDE, lessthenequal ~~~~
hth Björn
Marcio schrieb:

 Hi,
 
     Has anybody tried writing either Firefox or Thunderbird plugins in 
 D? Having to use C++ is just a no-no.
 
     I know one can use JavaScript for plugins, but I think the 
 possibilities are different from using C++. So, ideally I'd like the 
 full extension API available, but use D.
 
     Thanks,
 
 marcio
Nov 15 2006
next sibling parent jcc7 <technocrat7 gmail.com> writes:
== Quote from BLS (Killing_Zoe web.de)'s article

 Sorry, I am not able to supply you with dedicated info. but probablely a
 guy named bobef has some code ... Have a look at D Links ->
 AKIDE, lessthenequal ~~~~


I think you're referring to "mozplugged" by bobef and this is the best link I
could find:

http://www.dsource.org/projects/rulesplayer/wiki/mozplugged_home


 hth Björn
 Marcio schrieb:

 Hi,

     Has anybody tried writing either Firefox or Thunderbird plugins in
 D? Having to use C++ is just a no-no.

     I know one can use JavaScript for plugins, but I think the
 possibilities are different from using C++. So, ideally I'd like the
 full extension API available, but use D.

     Thanks,

 marcio
Nov 15 2006
prev sibling parent bobef <be lessequal_dontspam.com> writes:
Yes, but I haven't translated the XPCOM headers (*COM sucks in my 
opinion) so with what I've done you basically create a window or 
windowless plugin (windowless is not tested) and you do whatever you 
like with it in D. You have some degree of control over the browser, 
some events notifications - the plugin API is wrapped. Me personally 
wanted to create a MPlayer plugin and move my player to XUL to make it 
cross platform, but I gave up because of all these XPCOM interfaces are 
hell. But it worked - I got a working movie inside the browser and I was 
able to call D from javascript and vice versa...


BLS wrote:

 Sorry, I am not able to supply you with dedicated info. but probablely a 
 guy named bobef has some code ... Have a look at D Links ->
 AKIDE, lessthenequal ~~~~
 hth Björn
 Marcio schrieb:

 Hi,

     Has anybody tried writing either Firefox or Thunderbird plugins in 
 D? Having to use C++ is just a no-no.

     I know one can use JavaScript for plugins, but I think the 
 possibilities are different from using C++. So, ideally I'd like the 
 full extension API available, but use D.

     Thanks,

 marcio
Dec 04 2006