[Jetpack] UI on Android

[desktopd (Desktopd Mozilla Product Lead)]

Continuing the discussion from [Support] ClickGuard:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/clickguard/

@desktopd

The problem here is mostly about support for anything other than desktop Firefox. Most prominently, UI related SDK modules do not work at all on Fennec. Neither do they on Seamonkey. This means one of the SDK’s main (perceived) goals is not met.

The SDK high-level API module sdk/ui is not supported on Fennec.
Our add-on ClickGuard needs per-tab toggle user experience for Android (and no more than that). We are using a hotkey (!) now. We want to avoid writing require("chrome") where possible. Must we wait for WebExtensions? Is there any option available?
Thanks.

[freaktechnik (Martin Giger)]

Android has a “PageActions.jsm” that you can require() in the SDK. While this is not require("chrome") it is still considered a non-SDK API. I couldn’t find any documentation of its API on MDN, however you can find its source here: https://dxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/mobile/android/modules/PageActions.jsm

To load it with the SDK you’d do something like:

const { PageActions } = require("resource://gre/modules/PageActions.jsm");

PageActions.add(...);

If you want a button in the overflow menu or a context menu item NativeWindow is the API to use.