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Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

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Re: Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

#21

Post by Hurdy »

Griever wrote: post #11
untog wrote: post #2

Interesting - and a very good job given what you have to work with. Surely its incredibly brittle, though? As soon as they release a new version of Gmail it's going to fail. But then, I suppose that's how most Chrome extensions work.

Yeah, the strange selector names that never cease to change were what ultimately caused me to abandon my relatively popular Chrome extension "Gmail Attachments to Drive". Having to constantly update the code every time Gmail changed just got old really, really fast.

There's a new "Save to drive" button now anyway!

Re: Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

#22

Post by kartikt »

typpo wrote: post #16

This is pretty useful. A couple months ago I started making a free self-hosted version of Boomerang for Gmail, but lost interest because I felt like I would have to devote most of my time to gmail's idiosyncrasies. Maybe it's time to get back to work. Is there a way to add navigation events (eg. user opened email) to the observe gmail.observe API? Right now it looks like I would have to poll gmail.check.is_inside_ema…

Definitely! Mind creating an issue out of it? I'll add it to the list

Re: Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

#23

Post by kartikt »

grinich wrote: post #18

Unfortunately this type of hacking isn't really sustainable. Even small tweaks to the Gmail UI often change the DOM in very unpredictable ways. When they released the new compose feature, pretty much every single Gmail Chrome extension broke. We haven't really announced it yet, but I've been working on a new email platform with some friends to solve a lot of these issues. It's essentially Rails/Meteor for email featu…

Thanks for your feedback. I agree, which is why i decided to put it out there because I use the library in a chrome extension and if something breaks, I would be trying to get the extension fixed - patching gmail.js. Still better than finding random solutions from here and there or duplicating efforts. :-) I'd be interested in seeing what you guys are working so, so I'll ping you soon

Re: Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

#24

Post by togasystems »

I use Selenium tests that run on a cron job to check for elements on third-party websites. This works great and I am able to keep the extension mostly up to date. One of the issues I have come up against is when a third-party A/B tests. I usually have to hack around and find an account with the B portion to make sure everything works.

Re: Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

#27

Post by Griever »

Hurdy wrote: post #21
Griever wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, the strange selector names that never cease to change were what ultimately caused me to abandon my relatively popular Chrome extension "Gmail Attachments to Drive". Having to constantly update the code every time Gmail changed just got old really, really fast.

There's a new "Save to drive" button now anyway!

True! And because of that, the project would have been killed regardless. A year ago though, this was not the case.

Re: Show HN: Gmail.js – JavaScript API for Gmail

#29

Post by jamesjyu »

Author of Gmailr here, which apparently inspired this project. Kudos! Glad to see someone taking the ball and running with it. I haven't had time to update Gmailr lately, as it is something that needs active maintenance. The main challenge here is that Gmail will have continue to have bursts of updates that break extension libraries, with relatively long periods of stability.
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