To the consternation of many, Word integration support turned out to be broken in the initial version of Juris-M 5.0. The bug was fixed in a followup release (5.0.17.1), but an explanation is in order.

The underlying cause was quite simple. The source code of the Standalone client inherited from Zotero contains a standard file of descriptive data called application.ini. There is a value name in this file, which I had changed from Zotero to Jurism. The macro bundle inserted into Word for integration support relies on this value to communicate with the client. When there is no application named Zotero, the Word macro complains, and nothing works.

Fixing the bug was a simple matter of reverting the name value; but the task of tracking down the problem alerted me to some complexity in the Juris-M ecosystem that is no longer necessary.

In the Firefox ecosystem, plugins are identified by their unique product ID. The word processor integration plugins maintained by the Zotero team are configured to install only if Zotero (sniffed by its ID) is also installed. Back in the very early days, when Juris-M was called “Multilingual Zotero” (aka “MLZ”), I cheated on this system by giving the “MLZ” plugin the same product ID as Zotero itself. As a result, the Zotero word processor plugins worked just fine with my hacked-up version of Zotero.

Move forward to 2015, when Firefox began requiring that plugins be submitted for signing by their maintainers. This was also around the time that MLZ was relabeled as Juris-M. To satisfy the signing requirement, I had to give Juris-M its own unique product ID; and when I did so, the Zotero word processor integration plugins refused to install. In a house-that-Jack-built domino effect, this forced me to rebundle the Zotero integration plugins with Juris-M identifiers, and submit them separately for signing. In addition to adding the ID, I changed the logo and made some other minor changes, but the underlying code was Zotero-original all the way.

The signing procedures were intended to block malicious code from the Firefox platform. In practice, they proved to be a considerable headache to developers. The requirement was loosened after a rancorous exchange between the development lead at Zotero and the Firefox team. However, the roadmap laid out by Firefox to address legitimate security concerns with their plugin infrastructure promised to make continuation of Zotero in that environment difficult. Accordingly, the Zotero team have laid out a long-term plan to migrate to another platform (Electron).

Now move further forward to 2017. From Firefox 55, Zotero will no longer run as a browser plugin. As an interim solution, Zotero 5.0 and Juris-M 5.0 standalone clients are being run on a pre-version-55 copy of Firefox, with the browser elements stripped out, and with the signing requirement disabled by default.

This brings us back to the original issue. Since the native Zotero word processor integration plugins can communicate quite happily with Juris-M, and since the signing requirement no longer applies in the 5.0 Standalone clients, there is no longer a reason to maintain separate copies of these plugins. I can use the native plugin code, inserting only a tiny tweak to extend compatibility to Juris-M. Less code to maintain, improved stability, what’s not to love?

That is why, if you examine the list of Add-on extensions in Juris-M 5.0, you will see a bright shiny Zotero logo next to the integration plugins—we’re finally back to getting the full labor-saving benefit of open source publication there.

And so at length our tale of a shaggy dog arrives at its felicitous conclusion.

FB