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macOS Sequoia 15.0 disables third-party QuickLook plugins; will indexing epubs still be available? [message #1847] Tue, 17 September 2024 02:43 Go to next message
Grant Barrett
Messages: 32
Registered: October 2019
Member
Hi, just wanted to let you know that in macOS Sequoia, which was released today, third-party QuickLook plugins will need to be updated to work with a new API. I believe that FoxTrot uses QuickLook plugins in order to know what to index. For one example, there is no macOS first-party (that is, Apple-made) QuickLook plugin, so to index epubs, we have to use third-party plugins like the ones on this page: https://github.com/sindresorhus/quick-look-plugins. However, *none* of the third-party QuickLook plugins I currently have work with the new macOS, and the xattr methods outlined on that page work no longer. These comments on Reddit may offer guidance https://www.reddit.com/r/macapps/comments/1f00bbx/comment/lj ptsy4/ especially the link to the new QuickLook API information: "Support for deprecated Quick Look Generator plugins is being removed. To provide previews and thumbnails for your custom file types, migrate to Quick Look Preview Extension and Thumbnail Extension API. (116791365)." *None* of the epub QuickLook plugins linked in previous discussions in this forum seem to work. For example: https://forum.foxtrot-search.com/index.php?t=msg&goto=74 6 I have not looked into whether markdown QuickLook plugins are working.

Some relevant pages:
https://github.com/sindresorhus/quick-look-plugins
https://github.com/jaketmp/ePub-quicklook/
https://github.com/GenjiApp/EPUB-Plugins
https://github.com/mustafaalbazy/EPUB-Plugins
Re: macOS Sequoia 15.0 disables third-party QuickLook plugins; will indexing epubs still be available? [message #1848 is a reply to message #1847] Tue, 17 September 2024 11:48 Go to previous messageGo to next message
FoxTrot Engineering
Messages: 406
Registered: April 2020
Senior Member
This is true, third-party Quick Look plugins that use the deprecated API (generators) are no longer supported by macOS 15, and FoxTrot cannot use the new API (extensions) in the same way as it used the old one. However, some clarifications:
- this only affects the display of found documents; indexing relies on a different kind of plugins: Spotlight metadata extractors, which have not changed.
- Apple-provided Quick Look plugins are still supported, even though they still use the old generator API. So you can still benefit from occurrence highlighting and navigation for Pages or Numbers documents, for example.
- the new API is supported the way Apple wants third-party applications to support it, i.e. without giving the application access to the displayed data. FoxTrot won't be able to highlight or navigate through found occurrences when using these Quick Look extensions.
- you can still highlight or navigate through found occurrences by viewing the plain text version of the document as it was indexed
- to switch between the limited Quick Look preview, the plain text preview, or FoxTrot's enhanced preview when available, use the popup menu in the toolbar


Jérôme - FoxTrot Engineering
Re: macOS Sequoia 15.0 disables third-party QuickLook plugins; will indexing epubs still be available? [message #1849 is a reply to message #1848] Tue, 17 September 2024 13:00 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Grant Barrett
Messages: 32
Registered: October 2019
Member
Would FoxTrot consider bundling into the app the QuickLook viewers it needs? Viewing text works but it is inelegant because of line breaks and missing formatting.
Re: macOS Sequoia 15.0 disables third-party QuickLook plugins; will indexing epubs still be available? [message #1850 is a reply to message #1849] Wed, 18 September 2024 01:14 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Grant Barrett
Messages: 32
Registered: October 2019
Member
By the way, on startup, Foxtrot still asks if the user wants to run the xattr command on QuickLook extensions if they don't have the correct attributes.

[Updated on: Wed, 18 September 2024 01:14]

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Re: macOS Sequoia 15.0 disables third-party QuickLook plugins; will indexing epubs still be available? [message #1851 is a reply to message #1850] Wed, 18 September 2024 09:17 Go to previous messageGo to next message
FoxTrot Engineering
Messages: 406
Registered: April 2020
Senior Member
Quote:
Foxtrot still asks if the user wants to run the xattr command on QuickLook extensions if they don't have the correct attributes
What do you mean by "still"? If you accept to clear the quarantine flag (and provide the admin password if required), this should happen only once. If you decline (or don't provide the admin password if required), then yes, you will be prompted again next time you launch FoxTrot (maybe we should then propose to delete those quarantined extensions, or at least to reveal them in the Finder, as it does not make sense to keep them installed…).
Do you have a different experience?


Jérôme - FoxTrot Engineering
Re: macOS Sequoia 15.0 disables third-party QuickLook plugins; will indexing epubs still be available? [message #1866 is a reply to message #1851] Tue, 01 October 2024 02:23 Go to previous message
Grant Barrett
Messages: 32
Registered: October 2019
Member
You're right — it only asked once. I probably would not recommend deleting the extensions, as it seems a bit intrusive. Perhaps listing the non-working ones similar to the way you list the files that are too big or didn't index?

By the way, the Murasaki ebook reader contains a working epub QuickLook extension. It's USD$8. https://apps.apple.com/us/app/murasaki-epub-reader/id4303007 62?mt=12 At least, it works in the Finder. However, in FT, it seems to still be showing the unformatted text view. See the attached images.
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