Copy Selection as Markdown

Copy title, URL, selection as Markdown

Note

This extension isn't abandoned; it's in maintenance mode because its current state is stable and feature-complete for my needs (I use it every hour). I don't plan to add new features or make major changes, except for the update to manifest V3, which might be the last update. I may address critical issues as they arise, but other issues may not be resolved. Thanks!

Install

• Mozilla Firefox: Go to Add-ons for Firefox and install.
• Google Chrome: You have to build and install at your own risk. No store distribution at this moment.

Usage

Right click and select:

• when part of the page is selected: Copy Selection as Markdown
• when user context-clicks in the page: Copy Title and URL as Markdown (only available on Firefox)
• when user context-clicks in the link: Copy Link as Markdown (only available on Firefox)

Toolbar button is also available.

Since v0.18.0, rich text (text/html) version of the selection will be copied to the clipboard as well. Almost all of users of this extension might be using plain text editor, but it should be useful for using with Slack.

Settings

The add-on has multiple configuration to suit your setup as follows. Set your preference by:

• Firefox:
  1. Click the menu button and choose Add-ons. The Add-ons Manager tab will open
  2. In the Add-ons Manager tab, select the Extensions panel
  3. Click Copy Selection as Markdown and click Preferences tab
  4. Hit Save button on the top to apply changes (no restart required)
• Chrome:
  1. Go to chrome://extension
  2. Click Copy Selection as Markdown and click Details tab
  3. Click Extension options
  4. Hit Save button on the top to apply changes (no restart required)

General

• Prepend quote (>) to selection
• Include link to source web page in the beginning of copied text
• Enable experimental MathJax support
• Disable link styling (like this (https://example.com) instead of [like this](https://example.com))

Shortcut Key

• macOS: Command + Shift + E
• Windows/Linux: Ctrl + Shift + E

To change shortcut key, click gear icon on top-right and click Manage Extension Shortcuts, or chrome://extensions/shortcuts.

Markdown Styles

• Enable GitHub Flavored Markdown (strikethrough, tables, and taskListItems) support
• Use img tag for image instead of ![title](url for image)
• Reduce padding spaces for list items
• Replace <> with HTML entities

Heading style

• Setext

  Heading 1
  =========
  Heading 2
  ---------
  

• ATX (default)

  # Heading 1
  ## Heading 2
  

Bullet list marker

• Minus (-) (default)

  - one
  - two
  - three
  

• Plus (+)

  + one
  + two
  + three
  

• Asterisk (*)

  * one
  * two
  * three
  

Code block style

• Indented (default)

          let code = "indented";
  

• Fenced

      ```
      code = "fenced";
      ```
  

Fence

• Backticks (```) (default)

      ```
      let code = "fenced";
      ```
  

• Tildes (~)

      ~~~
      let code = "fenced";
      ~~~
  

Em

• Underline (_) (default)

  _Em_
  

• Asterisk (*)

  *Em*
  

Strong

• Underlines (__)

  __Strong__
  

• Asterisks (*) (default)

  **Strong**
  

Link style

• Inlined (default)

  [Inlined](https://example.com)
  

• Referenced

  [Referenced][1]<br/>
  [1]: https://example.com
  

Link reference style

• Reference (default)

  [Reference][1]
  
  [1]: https://example.com
  

• Collapsed

  [Reference with collapsed style][]
  
  [Reference with collapsed style]: https://example.com
  

• Shortcut

  [Reference with shortcut style]
  
  [reference with shortcut style]: https://example.com
  

Advanced

• Title Substitution -- line separated texts which will be removed from title text. (supports regular expressions if the line starts and ends with / e.g. /^number:\d$/. Please escape | with \.) If you add - Mozilla | MDN to the textbox, the copied text wil be:
  • From [Add-ons - Mozilla | MDN](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons)
  • To [Add-ons](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Mozilla/Add-ons)
• Embed imgs (.gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .png, and .webp) as base64 -- images will be encoded as base64 text, instead of URL, and added at the end of copied text. Sometime it might fail but useful for backup. See Permissions.

Contributing

Please read CONTRIBUTING for details.

FAQ: Not working on Mozilla related sites

By default, no add-on can interfere pre-configured domains for security reason. You can configure this behavior at either of

• about:config → extensions.webextensions.restrictedDomains preference. See Configuration Editor for Firefox | Firefox Help for how to change the preference.
• Starting with Firefox 116, you can also control this behavior for this extension in the Add-ons Manager. See Why are some add-ons not allowed on sites restricted by Mozilla? | Firefox Help for how to change the preference.

Default list of restricted domains (See modules/libpref/init/all.js) as of 2023-08-21:

• accounts-static.cdn.mozilla.net
• accounts.firefox.com
• addons.cdn.mozilla.net
• addons.mozilla.org
• api.accounts.firefox.com
• content.cdn.mozilla.net
• discovery.addons.mozilla.org
• install.mozilla.org
• oauth.accounts.firefox.com
• profile.accounts.firefox.com
• support.mozilla.org
• sync.services.mozilla.com

License

This extension is released under the MIT License. See LICENSE for details.

Acknowledgements

• Turndown, which does all the heavy lifting from HTML to markdown
• Octicons clippy

Privacy

The add-on does not store any user data outside of the Firefox user profile. The conversion to markdown is solely done locally. The add-on never send user action/data to any server.

Permissions

See permissions - Mozilla | MDN for more detail.

Permission	Optional	Description
activeTab		to run copy functionality at active tab
clipboardWrite		to write to clipboard obviously
contextMenus		to add context menus
storage		to store preferences
<all_urls>	X	when Embed imgs (.gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .png, and .webp) as base64 text as possible option is set, the extension requests this permission since sometimes referenced images are hosted other than current active tab's URL so activeTab permission is not sufficient. If the option's not set, the extension removes this permission.