Watch for navigation via the new Navigation API

[fregante]

Browsers now have access to all navigation events thanks to the navigation API.

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Navigation_API

We should drop the browser.webNavigation-based events from the background and just use the new API directly in the content script

pixiebrix-extension/src/background/navigation.ts

Lines 72 to 75 in 4a103ed

	browser.webNavigation.onHistoryStateUpdated.addListener(onNavigation);
	browser.webNavigation.onReferenceFragmentUpdated.addListener(
	debouncedOnNavigation
	);

pixiebrix-extension/src/contentScript/lifecycle.ts

Line 570 in 4a103ed

export async function handleNavigate({

This does not affect the pageEditor’s listeners, because you can't listen to the navigation of other frames.

Related issue:

• The Page Editor does not always update when clicking the browser’s back button #4257

[fregante]

This would reduce the reliance on the background page and the amount of messaging required during navigation.

I'll mark this as mv3 only because it would be particularly beneficial there.

[twschiller]

NOTE: Chromium-only (not Firefox/Safari) is OK.

Related discussion about SPA event detection: w3c/webextensions#446

This would reduce the reliance on the background page and the amount of messaging required during navigation.

Although, listening for navigation could be a good way to avoid the background worker being recycled

[fregante]

listening for navigation could be a good way to avoid the background worker being recycled

If that actually helps we can keep the listeners enabled without having to also using the messaging channel. This has the added benefit that when the worker is eventually and necessarily restarted, the navigation doesn't have to wait for it to complete loading.