tabby-browser

A Tabby plugin that adds a web browser tab, so you can keep docs, dashboards, or a web app right next to your terminals.

Rendering uses an Electron WebContentsView overlaid on the tab (created via @electron/remote), rather than a <webview> tag — Tabby ships with webviewTag disabled, so the overlay approach is what actually works.

Features

• Browser tab with an address bar — back / forward / reload buttons and a URL bar.
• Web app tab — a single page without browser controls; prompts for a URL, then fills the tab. Restored on restart like a terminal. Opened from a button next to New terminal / Profiles & connections.
• Session recovery — open browser tabs are saved and restored on restart, just like terminals (each remembers its URL and chromeless mode).
• Keyboard reload — F5 / Ctrl+R / Cmd+R reload the page (works in the chromeless tab too).
• Settings — Settings → Browser: set a homepage and toggle visibility of the Open browser / Web app buttons.
• Links that open a new window (target="_blank", window.open) open in a new browser tab.

Install

Plugin Manager (recommended)

Open Tabby → Settings → Plugins, search for tabby-browser, and click Install. Restart Tabby when prompted.

npm (manual)

Install into Tabby's plugin directory and restart Tabby:

cd ~/.config/tabby/plugins
npm install tabby-browser

On Windows the path is %APPDATA%\tabby\plugins, on macOS ~/Library/Application Support/tabby/plugins.

From source

git clone https://github.com/karolnowacki/tabby-browser.git
cd tabby-browser
npm install
npm run build

Then link the built plugin into Tabby's plugin directory and restart Tabby:

mkdir -p ~/.config/tabby/plugins/node_modules
ln -s "$PWD" ~/.config/tabby/plugins/node_modules/tabby-browser

Usage

• Toolbar globe button → browser tab with an address bar.
• Web app button (by New terminal) → single-page tab without browser controls; type a URL and hit Go.
• F5 / Ctrl+R / Cmd+R → reload the current page.

Development

npm run watch   # rebuild on change; reload the Tabby window to pick up changes

Reload the Tabby window with location.reload() in DevTools (Ctrl+Shift+I), or restart Tabby.

Requirements & notes

• Tabby ≥ 1.0.2xx (built and tested against tabby-core 1.0.231-nightly).
• Relies on Tabby's renderer having nodeIntegration + @electron/remote available (the default), and Electron ≥ 30 for WebContentsView.
• The web view is a native layer painted over the tab; it's hidden automatically when you switch away from the tab.
• Because the WebContentsView is a native layer painted over the tab, Tabby's own modal dialogs (settings, command palette, profile selector) may appear beneath the page while a browser tab is active — switch away from the browser tab to interact with them.

Contributing

Issues and PRs welcome: https://github.com/karolnowacki/tabby-browser/issues

License

MIT © Karol Nowacki