In order for any user-visible change to be accepted into the mainline, it
must be accompanied by accurate documentation. The docs are written in an
XML dialect similar to XHTML, with a few tags specific to our
documentation. For example:
<item>
<tags><F1> :help :h help</tags>
<spec>:h<oa>elp</oa> <oa>subject</oa></spec>
<spec><F1></spec>
<description>
<p>
Open the help page. The default page, as specified by <o>helpfile</o> is shown
unless <oa>subject</oa> is specified. If you need help for a specific topic, try
<ex>:help overview</ex>.
</p>
</description>
</item>
creates a new help section for the command :help and for
the related key binding, <F1>. It also creates help tags
for the command, its shortcuts, the key binding, and the general
topic, ‘help’. These tags enable linking to this section from
other mentions of the topic and from the :help command.
The following is a list of the more common XML tags used in help pages,
along with their highlight groups.
- Layout
|
- p
- A paragraph (HelpParagraph)
|
- h1
- A first-level heading (HelpHead1)
|
- h2
- A second-level heading (HelpHead2)
|
- h3
- A third-level heading (HelpHead3)
|
- h4
- A fourth-level heading (HelpHead4)
|
- code
- A pre-formatted code block. (HelpCode)
|
- note
- Note: A note paragraph. (HelpNote)
|
- strut
- A horizontal strut which prevents any previous floating elements from appearing below it.
|
- warning
- Warning: A warning paragraph. (HelpWarning)
|
- Generic
|
- link
- A generic link. (HelpLink)
|
- @topic
- The topic of the link. Either a help topic or a fully-qualified URI.
|
- em
- Emphasized text. (HelpEm)
|
- str
- A string, with its contents wrapped in quotes. (HelpString)
|
- logo
- Pentadactyl's logo. (Logo)
|
- Items
|
- item
- A help entry (HelpItem)
|
- tags
- See the 'Tagging' section (HelpTags)
|
- spec
- The specification for this item, such as an example command line. (HelpSpec)
|
- strut
- A horizontal formatting strut which ensures that all previous <tags> and <spec> elements appear above the ones that follow.
|
- type
- For options, the type of the option.
number, boolean, string, stringlist, or charlist.
(HelpType)
|
- default
- For options, the default value. (HelpDefault)
|
- description
- The description of this help item. (HelpDescription)
|
- @short
- Indicates that this is a short description which should appear between the specs and tags.
|
- a
- Required {argument}. (HelpArg)
|
- oa
- Optional [argument]. (HelpOptionalArg)
|
- Tagging
|
- tags
- Space-separated list of strings to tag. Displayed right-aligned, and used for cross-linking. (HelpTags)
|
- @tag
- The tag attribute. Applied to any element, generates a <tags> element for the given tags. (HelpTag)
|
- Linking
|
- o
- Link to an option. (HelpOpt)
|
- ex
- Link to an Ex command. (HelpEx)
|
- k
- Link to a key. (HelpKey)
|
- @name
- The name attribute to <k>. When provided, <{value}> is prepended to
the element's contents, i.e., <k name="Tab"/> becomes <Tab>.
|
- @mode
- The mode attribute to <k>. Some keys have different functions in different modes.
You can use this attribute to specify which of the modes (other than Normal) a key pertains to.
The <{value}> is prepended to the element's contents, i.e., <k name="C-i" mode="I"/>
becomes I_<C-i>, and <k mode="t">i</k> becomes t_i.
|
- t
- Links to an arbitrary help topic. (HelpTopic)
|
- Plugins
|
- @lang
- When applied to any element under
<plugin>, that element is only visible for a specific
locale.
|
- plugin
- The container tag used for describing a plugin.
|
- @name
- The name of the plugin. Used as the plugin's help tag.
|
- @version
- The plugin's version number.
|
- @href
- The plugin's home page.
|
- @summary
- A short description of the plugin, shown in its section head.
|
- info
- An element with the same
attributes as plugin, which may override the latter for
specific locales
|
- project
- The project for which this plugin was intended.
|
- @name
- The name of the project (i.e., Pentadactyl)
|
- @min-version
- The minimum version of the project for which this plugin is intended to work.
|
- @max-version
- The maximum version of the project for which this plugin is intended to work.
|
- author
- The plugin's author. May appear more than once.
|
- @href
- The author's home page.
|
- @email
- The author's email address.
|
- license
- The plugin's license. May appear more than once.
|
- @href
- The URI of a page which shows or explains the license.
|
You can also autogenerate most of the XML help after you have
written a new command, mapping or option.
Writing Pentadactyl plugins is incredibly simple. Plugins are
simply JavaScript files which run with full chrome privileges and
have full access to the Pentadactyl and Firefox APIs.
Each plugin has its own global object, which means that the
variables and functions that you create won't pollute the global
window or private dactyl namespaces. This means
that there's no need to wrap your plugin in a closure, as is often
the practice in JavaScript development. Furthermore, any plugin
which is installed in your 'runtimepath'/plugins
directory will find its context stored in
plugins.<pluginName>, which is often invaluable during
development and testing.
Plugins are always initialized after the main window is loaded, so
there is no need to write load event handlers. Beyond
that, what you may do with your plugins is practically limitless.
Plugins have full access to all of the chrome resources that
ordinary Firefox does, along with the entire power of the
Pentadactyl API. If you need a starting point, have a look at some
existing plugins or
extensions,
especially the
Pentadactyl
source.
Plugins should provide inline documentation, which will appear on the
:help plugins page. The markup for help entries is the same
as the above, along with a few extra plugin-specific entries. Here is an
example from the popular flashblock extension:
use strict;
XML.ignoreWhitespace = false;
XML.prettyPrinting = false;
var INFO =
<plugin
nameflashblock
version1.0
hrefhttp://dactyl.sf.net/pentadactyl/plugins#flashblock-plugin
summaryFlash Blocker
xmlns{NS}>
<author emailmaglione.k@gmail.com>Kris Maglione</author>
<license hrefhttp://opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php>MIT</license>
<project namePentadactyl min-version1.0/>
<p>
This plugin provides the same features as the ever popular FlashBlock
Firefox addon. Flash animations are substituted with place holders which
play the original animation when clicked. Additionally, this plugin provides
options to control which sites can play animations without restrictions, and
triggers to toggle the playing of animation on the current page.
</p>
<item>
<tags>'fb' 'flashblock'</tags>
<spec>'flashblock' 'fb'</spec>
<type>boolean</type>
<default>true</default>
<description>
<p>
Controls the blocking of flash animations. When true, place
holders are substituted for flash animations on untrusted sites.
</p>
</description>
</item>
[...]
</plugin>;
The inline XML is made possible by
E4X.
It is important that the documentation be assigned to the
INFO variable, or Pentadactyl will not be able
to find it. The XML property changes are not compulsory, but
they do prevent certain formatting problems that may occur
otherwise. Beginning your file with use strict, while
not required, helps to prevent a lot of common errors.
The documentation that you provide behaves exactly as other
Pentadactyl documentation, which means that the tags you
provide are available via :help with full tag
completion and cross-referencing support. Although documentation
is not required, we strongly recommend that all plugin authors
provide at least basic documentation of the functionality of
their plugins and of each of the options, commands, and
especially mappings that they provide.