Menu

The menu class is used to create native menus that can be used as application menus and context menus. This module is a main process module which can be used in a render process via the remote module.

Each menu consists of multiple menu items and each menu item can have a submenu.

Below is an example of creating a menu dynamically in a web page (render process) by using the remote module, and showing it when the user right clicks the page:

<!-- index.html -->
<script>
const remote = require('electron').remote;
const Menu = remote.Menu;
const MenuItem = remote.MenuItem;

var menu = new Menu();
menu.append(new MenuItem({ label: 'MenuItem1', click: function() { console.log('item 1 clicked'); } }));
menu.append(new MenuItem({ type: 'separator' }));
menu.append(new MenuItem({ label: 'MenuItem2', type: 'checkbox', checked: true }));

window.addEventListener('contextmenu', function (e) {
  e.preventDefault();
  menu.popup(remote.getCurrentWindow());
}, false);
</script>

An example of creating the application menu in the render process with the simple template API:

var template = [
  {
    label: 'Edit',
    submenu: [
      {
        label: 'Undo',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+Z',
        role: 'undo'
      },
      {
        label: 'Redo',
        accelerator: 'Shift+CmdOrCtrl+Z',
        role: 'redo'
      },
      {
        type: 'separator'
      },
      {
        label: 'Cut',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+X',
        role: 'cut'
      },
      {
        label: 'Copy',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+C',
        role: 'copy'
      },
      {
        label: 'Paste',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+V',
        role: 'paste'
      },
      {
        label: 'Select All',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+A',
        role: 'selectall'
      },
    ]
  },
  {
    label: 'View',
    submenu: [
      {
        label: 'Reload',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+R',
        click: function(item, focusedWindow) {
          if (focusedWindow)
            focusedWindow.reload();
        }
      },
      {
        label: 'Toggle Full Screen',
        accelerator: (function() {
          if (process.platform == 'darwin')
            return 'Ctrl+Command+F';
          else
            return 'F11';
        })(),
        click: function(item, focusedWindow) {
          if (focusedWindow)
            focusedWindow.setFullScreen(!focusedWindow.isFullScreen());
        }
      },
      {
        label: 'Toggle Developer Tools',
        accelerator: (function() {
          if (process.platform == 'darwin')
            return 'Alt+Command+I';
          else
            return 'Ctrl+Shift+I';
        })(),
        click: function(item, focusedWindow) {
          if (focusedWindow)
            focusedWindow.toggleDevTools();
        }
      },
    ]
  },
  {
    label: 'Window',
    role: 'window',
    submenu: [
      {
        label: 'Minimize',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+M',
        role: 'minimize'
      },
      {
        label: 'Close',
        accelerator: 'CmdOrCtrl+W',
        role: 'close'
      },
    ]
  },
  {
    label: 'Help',
    role: 'help',
    submenu: [
      {
        label: 'Learn More',
        click: function() { require('electron').shell.openExternal('http://electron.atom.io') }
      },
    ]
  },
];

if (process.platform == 'darwin') {
  var name = require('electron').remote.app.getName();
  template.unshift({
    label: name,
    submenu: [
      {
        label: 'About ' + name,
        role: 'about'
      },
      {
        type: 'separator'
      },
      {
        label: 'Services',
        role: 'services',
        submenu: []
      },
      {
        type: 'separator'
      },
      {
        label: 'Hide ' + name,
        accelerator: 'Command+H',
        role: 'hide'
      },
      {
        label: 'Hide Others',
        accelerator: 'Command+Alt+H',
        role: 'hideothers'
      },
      {
        label: 'Show All',
        role: 'unhide'
      },
      {
        type: 'separator'
      },
      {
        label: 'Quit',
        accelerator: 'Command+Q',
        click: function() { app.quit(); }
      },
    ]
  });
  // Window menu.
  template[3].submenu.push(
    {
      type: 'separator'
    },
    {
      label: 'Bring All to Front',
      role: 'front'
    }
  );
}

var menu = Menu.buildFromTemplate(template);
Menu.setApplicationMenu(menu);

`new Menu()`

Creates a new menu.

Methods

The menu class has the following methods:

`Menu.setApplicationMenu(menu)`

menu Menu

Sets menu as the application menu on OS X. On Windows and Linux, the menu will be set as each window's top menu.

`Menu.sendActionToFirstResponder(action)` OS X

action String

Sends the action to the first responder of application. This is used for emulating default Cocoa menu behaviors, usually you would just use the role property of MenuItem.

`Menu.buildFromTemplate(template)`

template Array

Generally, the template is just an array of options for constructing a MenuItem. The usage can be referenced above.

You can also attach other fields to the element of the template and they will become properties of the constructed menu items.

`Menu.popup([browserWindow, x, y, positioningItem])`

browserWindow BrowserWindow (optional) - Default is null.
x Number (optional) - Default is -1.
y Number (required if x is used) - Default is -1.
positioningItem Number (optional) OS X - The index of the menu item to be positioned under the mouse cursor at the specified coordinates. Default is -1.

Pops up this menu as a context menu in the browserWindow. You can optionally provide a x, y coordinate to place the menu at, otherwise it will be placed at the current mouse cursor position.

`Menu.append(menuItem)`

menuItem MenuItem

Appends the menuItem to the menu.

`Menu.insert(pos, menuItem)`

pos Integer
menuItem MenuItem

Inserts the menuItem to the pos position of the menu.

`Menu.items()`

Get an array containing the menu's items.

OS X has a completely different style of application menu from Windows and Linux, here are some notes on making your app's menu more native-like.

Standard Menus

On OS X there are many system defined standard menus, like the Services and Windows menus. To make your menu a standard menu, you should set your menu's role to one of following and Electron will recognize them and make them become standard menus:

window
help
services

OS X has provided standard actions for some menu items, like About xxx, Hide xxx, and Hide Others. To set the action of a menu item to a standard action, you should set the role attribute of the menu item.

Main Menu's Name

On OS X the label of application menu's first item is always your app's name, no matter what label you set. To change it you have to change your app's name by modifying your app bundle's Info.plist file. See About Information Property List Files for more information.

The [setMenu method][setMenu] of browser windows can set the menu of certain browser window.

You can make use of position and id to control how the item will be placed when building a menu with Menu.buildFromTemplate.

The position attribute of MenuItem has the form [placement]=[id], where placement is one of before, after, or endof and id is the unique ID of an existing item in the menu:

before - Inserts this item before the id referenced item. If the referenced item doesn't exist the item will be inserted at the end of the menu.
after - Inserts this item after id referenced item. If the referenced item doesn't exist the item will be inserted at the end of the menu.
endof - Inserts this item at the end of the logical group containing the id referenced item (groups are created by separator items). If the referenced item doesn't exist, a new separator group is created with the given id and this item is inserted after that separator.

When an item is positioned, all un-positioned items are inserted after it until a new item is positioned. So if you want to position a group of menu items in the same location you only need to specify a position for the first item.

Examples

Template:

[
  {label: '4', id: '4'},
  {label: '5', id: '5'},
  {label: '1', id: '1', position: 'before=4'},
  {label: '2', id: '2'},
  {label: '3', id: '3'}
]

Menu:

- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5

Template:

[
  {label: 'a', position: 'endof=letters'},
  {label: '1', position: 'endof=numbers'},
  {label: 'b', position: 'endof=letters'},
  {label: '2', position: 'endof=numbers'},
  {label: 'c', position: 'endof=letters'},
  {label: '3', position: 'endof=numbers'}
]

Menu:

- ---
- a
- b
- c
- ---
- 1
- 2
- 3

[setMenu]: https://github.com/atom/electron/blob/master/docs/api/browser-window.md#winsetmenumenu-linux-windows

FAQ

Class: Menu

`new Menu()`

Methods

`Menu.setApplicationMenu(menu)`

`Menu.sendActionToFirstResponder(action)` OS X

`Menu.buildFromTemplate(template)`

`Menu.popup([browserWindow, x, y, positioningItem])`

`Menu.append(menuItem)`

`Menu.insert(pos, menuItem)`

`Menu.items()`

Notes on OS X Application Menu

Standard Menus

Standard Menu Item Actions

Main Menu's Name

Setting Menu for Specific Browser Window (Linux Windows)

Menu Item Position

Examples

Menu

Class: Menu

new Menu()

Methods

Menu.setApplicationMenu(menu)

Menu.sendActionToFirstResponder(action) OS X

Menu.buildFromTemplate(template)

Menu.popup([browserWindow, x, y, positioningItem])

Menu.append(menuItem)

Menu.insert(pos, menuItem)

Menu.items()

Notes on OS X Application Menu

Standard Menus

Standard Menu Item Actions

Main Menu's Name

Setting Menu for Specific Browser Window (Linux Windows)

Menu Item Position

Examples

`new Menu()`

`Menu.setApplicationMenu(menu)`

`Menu.sendActionToFirstResponder(action)` OS X

`Menu.buildFromTemplate(template)`

`Menu.popup([browserWindow, x, y, positioningItem])`

`Menu.append(menuItem)`

`Menu.insert(pos, menuItem)`

`Menu.items()`