Add PLUGIN_SECTIONID env variable

[cspotcode]

How can I help you?

Today I hit a situation that I thought would be the perfect use-case for a plugin. Unfortunately, I hit some limitations of the current plugin implementation. This is understandable because it's experimental, and trying to support all possible use-cases is surely not a reasonable goal. However, I thought I'd share my use-case in case it inspires additional plugin features.

Use-case

Bind a hotkey to copy a markdown-formatted link to the current page or paragraph, for pasting into other apps which don't auto-detect that onenote: is a clickable link:

[Page Title Here](onenote:https://d.docs.live.net/restoftheurlhere)

Details

I use a to-do app that supports markdown hyperlinks. It doesn't automatically render onenote: links, but if I wrap them up in markdown [label](url) syntax, they render correctly. This lets me create ToDos with clickable links to associated OneNote pages.

Another benefit of markdown syntax: I can embed the page's title, which is good because the ToDo app has no way of fetching the URL's title from the web.

Plugin limitations

Unfortunately, when I tried to implement this as a plugin, I hit a couple issues.

1. It doesn't seem possible to run plugins by name from the command palette. Ideally I hit Ctrl+Shift+P, type "plug mark" and see "Run Plugin: Copy Markdown Link," hit enter.
2. Cannot construct the URL without access to section and page IDs. As far as I can tell, I can't get those from the page's XML.

[stevencohn]

The page ID should be an attribute of the top level Page element, attribute name "ID".

For the section ID, here's a proposed solution: There are a number of PLUGIN env variables your plugin can use, see the bottom of this OneMore Wiki page. It would be quite easy to add a PLUGIN_SECTIONID env variable when you run a page-scoped plugin.

[cspotcode]

Environment variables would be great, yeah.

---

I came across another use-case: modifying highlighted text, or otherwise accessing the caret position.

With this, I could bind hotkeys to create linked tasks in my chosen ToDo app. (my Outlook is broken so I can't use the sync w/MS ToDo)

I could highlight a line of text, hit a hotkey, and my plugin creates a ToDo task from the highlighted text, creating a bidirectional link between the ToDo and the text.

If I limit myself to focusing on a page's title, then I can setup a link between title and ToDo, since that doesn't require knowing caret position or selection.

EDIT nevermind, plugins do get the current selection! https://onemoreaddin.com/developers/TechNote%20-%20Editing%20Text.htm

[jasonjac2]

Could you add the Page ID to the environment variables as well, then for a lot of plugins, you might not need to parse the page at all?

[stevencohn]

Environment variables will include

• PLUGIN_ASCHILD - set to true when the Create as child option is checked
• PLUGIN_CREATE - set to true when the Create as new page option is checked
• PLUGIN_PAGENAME - specifies the name of the page to create or update
• PLUGIN_SOURCE_PAGEID - the OneNote ID of the source page
• PLUGIN_SOURCE_SECTIONID - the OneNote ID of the source page's section
• PLUGIN_SOURCE_NOTEBOOKID - the OneNote ID of the source page's notebook
• PLUGIN_SOURCE_PAGENAME - the title of the source page
• PLUGIN_SOURCE_PAGEPATH - the hierarchy path of the source page, including notebook, section, and page name
• PLUGIN_SOURCE_PAGEURL - the OneNote URL of the source page
• PLUGIN_SKIPLOCK - set to true when the Skip locked sections option is checked

[jasonjac2]

Section Groups - do they change the hierarchy of the path?
I'll have to read up on skipLock.
All brilliant - thanks.

[stevencohn]

Yes, section groups are part of the path.

Regarding skipLock, if a section is password-protected, the Plugin has no means to ask for a password and unlock it. So either it attempts to open it and will fail, or you specify Skip and it won't even try.