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 `img`s (.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.

0x6b/copy-selection-as-markdown