Detect tab URL change inside a Firefox add-on

Question

I have an extension, functional on Chrome, that monitors the active Tab for URL changes.

Specifically, I need to detect when the URL changes, but there is no new pag

Answer 1

Use ProgressListener to be notified about location changes.

To install a listener, convert SDK tab to its raw (old) representation using viewFor. Backward conversion is possible with modelFor and getTabForContentWindow.

const tabs = require("sdk/tabs");
const {viewFor} = require('sdk/view/core');
const {modelFor} = require('sdk/model/core');
const {getBrowserForTab, getTabForContentWindow} = require("sdk/tabs/utils");
const {Ci, Cu} = require("chrome");
Cu.import("resource://gre/modules/XPCOMUtils.jsm", this);

var progressListener = {
QueryInterface: XPCOMUtils.generateQI([Ci.nsIWebProgressListener, Ci.nsISupportsWeakReference]),
    onLocationChange: function(aProgress, aRequest, aURI) {
        var highLevel= modelFor(getTabForContentWindow(aProgress.DOMWindow));
        console.log("onLocationChange ", highLevel.url);
    }
};

tabs.on('open', function(newTab) {
    var lowLevel = viewFor(newTab);
    var browser = getBrowserForTab(lowLevel);
    browser.addProgressListener(progressListener);
});

Don't forget to remove listeners on extension unload. Tab listeners are removed automagically, but ProgressListeners won't be.

Inspired by Converting to chrome windows