Feature suggestion: Hide html comments such as from note-overview

[jeroenkroesen]

First off: hats off to you and much respect for developing this plugin. It took my joy of using Joplin from a 7 to a 9.

I'd love to try my hand at extending your plugin to add this feature:
Hide html comment tags such as those used for the note overview plugin

I maintain a second brain in joplin and use note overview extensively. Below is a snippet of my start page in Joplin:

# Start
###### t
|     |    |     |    |    |    |
|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|
| [:white_check_mark:<br>Do](:/b5753d22622e4054b06a74f9173b878f) | [:hash:<br>Topics](:/b37ad68e602e4cdba6c7530bfa748805) | [:closed_book:<br>Diary](:/aa24a870133f4a11996dc85a9e120abb) | [:scroll:<br>Articles](:/5e2dea3b8ab2460da1e0ca9f29047ead) | [:question:<br>Howto's](:/f5149812ccb94ab6ac87a7234579e79f) | [![dedimo_logo_24px_white.png](:/1ad1727725664cfb8b7d04edfd6a1193)<br>Dedimo](:/c775584f733348d09f2684b4c8c31cfc) |
[⬆️](#t)
***
<br>



<!-- note-overview-plugin
search: -tag:dedimo tag:.diary tag:time.{{moments:YYYY}}
  tag:time.{{moments:MMMM}} tag:time.day_{{moments:DD}}
fields: title
alias: title AS Today
sort: title ASC
-->
| Today |
| --- |
|[2025-04-09 Wednesday Diary](:/701de0ac578c4ee6aacc528a2bc5bda1)|
<!--endoverview-->

<!-- note-overview-plugin
search: -tag:dedimo tag:.diary tag:time.{{moments:YYYY}} tag:time.week_{{moments:WW}}
fields: title
alias: title AS This week
sort: title ASC
details:
  open: false
  summary: This week - {{count}}
-->
<details close>
<summary>This week - 7</summary>

| This week |
| --- |
|[2025-04-07 Monday Diary](:/3c106e85f804475fae88e5d94277dd5c)|
|[2025-04-08 Tuesday Diary](:/c534549e12f3469e917879c925d3d926)|
|[2025-04-09 Wednesday Diary](:/701de0ac578c4ee6aacc528a2bc5bda1)|
|[2025-04-10 Thursday Diary](:/71e7d124011c44d190f8fd679996cad8)|
|[2025-04-11 Friday Diary](:/dc40fa65ae1b4fceb43c6653670a797a)|
|[2025-04-12 Saturday Diary](:/5c9c013d033a4888ad85bb7ed00f235c)|
|[2025-04-13 Sunday Diary](:/740b08f7e0b54ccc8beaf2545292808b)|
</details>
<!--endoverview-->

I always switch this note to the Joplin viewer asap, because it's not very comfortable to read like this.

I imagine extending your plugin to make the same text look like this:

# Start
###### t
|     |    |     |    |    |    |
|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|-----|
| [:white_check_mark:<br>Do](:/b5753d22622e4054b06a74f9173b878f) | [:hash:<br>Topics](:/b37ad68e602e4cdba6c7530bfa748805) | [:closed_book:<br>Diary](:/aa24a870133f4a11996dc85a9e120abb) | [:scroll:<br>Articles](:/5e2dea3b8ab2460da1e0ca9f29047ead) | [:question:<br>Howto's](:/f5149812ccb94ab6ac87a7234579e79f) | [![dedimo_logo_24px_white.png](:/1ad1727725664cfb8b7d04edfd6a1193)<br>Dedimo](:/c775584f733348d09f2684b4c8c31cfc) |
[⬆️](#t)
***
<br>



| Today |
| --- |
|[2025-04-09 Wednesday Diary](:/701de0ac578c4ee6aacc528a2bc5bda1)|

<details close>
<summary>This week - 7</summary>

| This week |
| --- |
|[2025-04-07 Monday Diary](:/3c106e85f804475fae88e5d94277dd5c)|
|[2025-04-08 Tuesday Diary](:/c534549e12f3469e917879c925d3d926)|
|[2025-04-09 Wednesday Diary](:/701de0ac578c4ee6aacc528a2bc5bda1)|
|[2025-04-10 Thursday Diary](:/71e7d124011c44d190f8fd679996cad8)|
|[2025-04-11 Friday Diary](:/dc40fa65ae1b4fceb43c6653670a797a)|
|[2025-04-12 Saturday Diary](:/5c9c013d033a4888ad85bb7ed00f235c)|
|[2025-04-13 Sunday Diary](:/740b08f7e0b54ccc8beaf2545292808b)|
</details>

Would you be interested in this? If yes, would it be the correct way that I fork your repo and when done make a pull request?

Cheers and many thanks
Jeroen

[personalizedrefrigerator]

Would you be interested in this? If yes, would it be the correct way that I fork your repo and when done make a pull request?

Yes. Forking this repository and creating a pull request is the recommended way to contribute.

For reference,

• Most of the existing replacement-related logic can be found in src/contentScript/replace.
• codemirror.net has tutorials for creating replacement extensions.

[jeroenkroesen]

Thank you. Started working on it.

Would you like this to be in the Some or More category of md hiding? Or is a separate setting more appropriate?

[personalizedrefrigerator]

Would you like this to be in the Some or More category of md hiding? Or is a separate setting more appropriate?

For now, putting it under "some" might be more appropriate, since it doesn't rely on Joplin's renderMarkup command.

Note: It could also make sense to hide <!-- --> comments in general (rather than just metadata comments).

[jeroenkroesen]

Agree: I'm going with hiding comments in general right now.

Also: couldn't find appropriate tags in the markdown parser for this, so going with a regex approach. Hope that's ok with you.

[personalizedrefrigerator]

Also: couldn't find appropriate tags in the markdown parser for this, so going with a regex approach.

See this demo in CodeMirror's try-it editor — it should be CommentBlock.

[jeroenkroesen]

Sorry I missed that. Thanks! Switching back to the syntax tree.

[jeroenkroesen]

I've looked further into the replace decoration. An implementation issue for me is that it requires changes to makeBlockReplaceExtension. I'm thinking along the lines of: check if the returned decoration is Decoration.replace without a widget, and if so, apply it only to the node's precise range (node.from, node.to) instead of the full lines.

At this point, I'd prefer to go with the mark decoration.

I'm hesitant to change makeBlockReplaceExtension because it is so general and enables devs with very little codemirror experience like me to add features to your plugin.
Final say is up to you of course. I'll hold back on a pull request until you're happy.

[jeroenkroesen]

@personalizedrefrigerator I'll make some screenshots and addition the the README.md this weekend for the release. Can't wait to have a feature in Joplin I contributed to :D

[alexgoussev]

Or is a separate setting more appropriate?

I suppose a separate setting would be better.

[jeroenkroesen]

Feature has been accepted and merged. Waiting for release.