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Building Zutilo

To build the Zutilo xpi file, run make in the top level of the repository. This command creates build/zutilo.xpi. In order to build Zutilo, the following programs are needed:

  • zip
  • pandoc
  • python (version 3)
  • GNU coreutils (need make and sed to work)

As a quick work around, you can just zip everything in the addon/ folder and name it zutilo.xpi. The make machinery is mainly used for converting the README files from markdown to html and including them in the xpi file, but for testing you can just ignore the README file.

Overview of Zutilo codebase

Most of the Zutilo logic is contained in the files in addon/chrome/content/zutilo. The highlights are:

  • zutilo.js

    • addon/bootstrap.js loads this file when Zutilo starts up and it handles the rest of the Zutilo setup.
    • This file defines the Zutilo module.
    • The Zutilo module contains properties about Zutilo that are window independent.
    • The Zutilo module creates observers and listeners for loading the rest of the Zutilo code into each window.

  • zutiloChrome.js

    • Contains some basic UI element helper functions unrelated to specific Zutilo features

  • zoteroOverlay.js

    • Contains all of the functions that extend Zotero's UI and all of the Zutilo defined functions that interact with Zotero data

  • keys.js

    • Defines all of Zutilo's keyboard shortcut functions
    • To define a new shortcut:
      1. Create a new method of keys.shortcuts that is a function of a window object.
      2. Create a new entry in addon/chrome/locale/en-US/zutilo/zutilo.properties for zutilo.shortcuts.name.<method_name> where <method_name> is the method name used in step 1 (technically, you should create this entry for all other locales as well).

  • keyconfig_adapted.js

    • Code adapted from the KeyConfig extension for setting up Zutilo's keyboard shortcuts

  • preferences.js

    • Code for populating the preferences window dynamically

  • preferences.xul

    • Static layout for the preferences window.

The other relevant content of the addon are the zutilo.properties and zutilo.dtd files which contain the dynamically and statically loaded UI strings for Zutilo. These are located in the various different locale folders under addon/chrome/locale.