supporting-a-browser-or-app.md

Supporting a browser or app

Adding and maintaining the available browsers and apps is a community effort; I have now added support for all the browsers that I use, and any newly requested apps are either too niche or behind pay walls. However, by following this document you can add the browser yourself and submit it to be included in Browserosaurus. Don't worry, even if you've never contributed to an open source project before, I'll take you through the steps of how to add support for a new browser, and if something is confusing or you'd like a little extra help, please ask on the discussions forum, or even send a pull request to improve this documentation.

🚨 Any apps that receive an issue and are not fixed via a pull request, will be removed from subsequent releases.

Prerequisite

Fork the project to your GitHub account, and then make sure you are set-up for development.

Adding a new browser

Finding bundle identifier for an app

When Browserosaurus loads, it looks for which apps you have installed based on an allowed list of bundle identifiers. To find the ID of the app you'd like added, open your Terminal.app and run the following:

mdls -name kMDItemCFBundleIdentifier -r /PATH/TO/APP.app

For example, most apps are installed to /Applications:

mdls -name kMDItemCFBundleIdentifier -r /Applications/Firefox.app

In this case, you should receive an identifier that looks something like this:

org.mozilla.firefox

Adding the entry to Browserosaurus

Using your text editor (I recommend Visual Studio Code), open the /src/config/apps.ts file. After all the import statements, you'll see an apps object that contains all of the apps that Browserosaurus can find on a user's system. The key to each app object is the bundle identifier, so start by adding your new app to the list, and give it a name:

export const apps = {
  // ...
  'org.mozilla.firefox': {
    name: 'Firefox',
  },
  // ...
} as const

ℹ️ The app objects within the root apps object should be in alphabetical order by the name key. There's a test that will check for this. We'll discuss running tests below.

Adding a logo

All apps must have a logo, that you will no doubt have seen displayed in the picker window, when Browserosaurus shows. Most browser logos can be installed from an excellent project that contains almost all browser logos by Cătălin Mariș.

Following our example of using Firefox, the command to add the Firefox logo would be:

npm i @browser-logos/firefox

If you find the browser you'd like to add is not supported by Cătălin's project, or you're not adding a browser at all, you'll need to source the logo yourself. Please find a suitable 128x128 pixel logo and place it in the src/config/logos folder.

Import the browser from the location where you've installed it, and add it to a logo key in your app's object:

import firefox from '@browser-logos/firefox/firefox_128x128.png'

export const apps = {
  // ...
  'org.mozilla.firefox': {
    name: 'Firefox',
    logo: firefox,
  },
  // ...
} as const

That's all there is to it. Run your updated code using npm start, and see if it behaves how you would expect.

Extras

Private / Incognito Mode

Some browsers support opening in a private or incognito mode. Browserosaurus can be set to open the given URL in private mode when holding the shift key and clicking an app icon or using its hotkey. If you'd like to support this with your added browser, you will need to find the command-line argument that your browser uses when opening URLs from the command-line. In the case of Firefox this is --private-window:

export const apps = {
  // ...
  'org.mozilla.firefox': {
    name: 'Firefox',
    logo: firefox,
    privateArg: '--private-window',
  },
  // ...
} as const

URL Template

If you're adding an app that uses a different protocol, where the URL is just a parameter, you can use a URL template. The token {{URL}} in the string will be replaced with the incoming URL. For example, the Pocket app is set like so:

export const apps = {
  // ...
  'com.readitlater.PocketMac': {
    name: 'Pocket',
    urlTemplate: 'pocket://add?url={{URL}}',
    logo: pocket,
  },
  // ...
} as const

Testing

There are a few tests that will check the compatibility of your apps.ts file. Run npm test and make sure all tests successfully pass. If any tests fail, and you are unsure about the results, please submit your changes anyway and we can discuss it on the pull request page.

Submit your changes

Commit and push your changes to your GitHub fork of Browserosaurus, then open a pull request to merge your branch into Browserosaurus' master branch. Please note that this repository now follows the Conventional Commits standard, and so please structure your commit messages accordingly. The example above's commit message could look something like this: feat: add support for Firefox browser.