wxp

wxp is a WebView-based foundation for audio plugin UIs. It lets you write plugin GUIs in HTML / CSS / TypeScript and run them on a WebView powered by wry. It provides Tauri-like IPC (invoke / Channel) for concise bidirectional communication between Rust and JavaScript.

日本語: README_JA.md

Quick Start

use std::rc::Rc;
use wxp::{WebContext, WxpCommandHandler, WxpWebViewBuilder};

let mut web_context = WebContext::new(std::env::temp_dir().join("my-plugin"));
let handler = Rc::new(WxpCommandHandler::new());

// `webview` must be kept alive while the UI is shown (see Caveats below).
let webview = WxpWebViewBuilder::new(&mut web_context)
    .with_command_handler(handler)
    .with_url("http://localhost:5173/")
    .build_as_child(&window)?;

Caveats

• WxpWebView owns the native WebView and must stay on the run loop thread that created it.
• Clone WebViewDispatch when background work needs to post WebView operations. It is Send + Sync, but it does not keep the WebView alive and its methods enqueue work instead of waiting for results.
• Keep WxpWebView alive for as long as the UI should exist. Dropping it closes the native WebView, and stale command/channel work is ignored instead of extending the UI lifetime.

See the crates/wxp README for a detailed walkthrough of the crate (including platform support and the main-thread / lifetime caveats), and wrac-plugin-template for a full plugin project.

Repository Structure

Path	Description
crates/run_loop	Platform-independent run loop used by wxp and plugin UI helpers
crates/run_loop_timer	Lightweight repeating timer helper built on novonotes_run_loop
crates/wxp	WebView UI foundation (main crate)
crates/wry	Embedded upstream-based wry crate with plugin-host lifecycle fixes
crates/host_window	Dev dependency for wxp. Not intended for external use.
packages/webview-bridge	JS/TS IPC bridge (@novonotes/webview-bridge)

crates/wry tracks tauri-apps/wry but keeps small intent-based patches for audio plug-in hosts, where editor creation, parent-window attachment, and focus can happen in a different order than in a normal desktop application.

Project Status

The current status is alpha (0.1.0-alpha.x). wxp is used in production by NovoNotes, but the public API is still stabilizing — expect breaking changes between alpha releases.

Installation

• The Rust crate is not published to crates.io. Use it with a git + rev pin.
• @novonotes/webview-bridge has not been published to npm yet. It is distributed as a tarball via GitHub Releases.

Example Cargo configuration:

[dependencies]
wxp = { git = "https://github.com/novonotes/wxp.git", rev = "<latest commit hash on main branch>" }
run_loop_timer = { git = "https://github.com/novonotes/wxp.git", package = "run_loop_timer", rev = "<latest commit hash on main branch>" }

npm installation:

npm install https://files.novonotes.download/libs/novonotes-webview-bridge-0.1.0-alpha.1.tgz

License

MIT