Advice for keeping permalink symbol token stable

[meteorlxy]

We were using html_block token for permalink symbol in v7.x:

markdown-it-anchor/index.js

Line 24 in 828401d

Object.assign(new state.Token('html_block', '', 0), { content: opts.permalinkSymbol }),

Since v8.x, it's changed to html_inline (which is not the "exact" legacy implementation):

markdown-it-anchor/permalink.js

Line 31 in f5c0844

Object.assign(new state.Token('html_inline', '', 0), { content: opts.permalinkSymbol }),

It's an internal / undocumented breaking change, which might break some plugins that depend on markdown-it-anchor.

For example, we have a custom toc plugin, allowing html_inline in the heading to be displayed in the toc headers. Now we need one more step to filter the symbol token.

This issue is just a reminder in case next time you may change it unintentionally.

You can close it after reading 😄 @valeriangalliat

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BTW, do you have any advices for how to filter the permalink symbol token, and keep other html_inline tokens?

[valeriangalliat]

Ouuh, good catch, the legacy version should be identical in all points, I'll publish a patch for this

As for your question, I think that including the toc plugin before markdown-it-anchor would solve the problem, since the toc would be generated before the anchors are added to the token stream?

[valeriangalliat]

The legacy permalink is compliant with the actual legacy implementation in 8.0.5!

[meteorlxy]

As for your question, I think that including the toc plugin before markdown-it-anchor would solve the problem, since the toc would be generated before the anchors are added to the token stream?

We are using the slug generated by markdown-it-anchor (i.e. id attr of the heading_open token) as the href link of the toc, so it's better to generate toc after anchor.

[meteorlxy]

@valeriangalliat Is it possible to add a meta.isPermalinkSymbol (or similar) to the symbol token? 🤔

[valeriangalliat]

Ah I see, makes sense. meta.isPermalinkSymbol seems like a great idea indeed! I've made a PR for this, #99, feel free to test against it (npm i valeriangalliat/markdown-it-anchor#feature/permalink-symbol-meta) and let me know if that solves your problem :)