# Announce node-red-contrib-msg-toggle (Feedback request)

**URL:** <https://discourse.nodered.org/t/announce-node-red-contrib-msg-toggle-feedback-request/10705>\
**Category:** Share Your Nodes\
**Created:** [1 May 2019 07:13 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/announce-node-red-contrib-msg-toggle-feedback-request/10705 "2019-05-01T07:13:23Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![BartButenaers](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/bartbutenaers/32/10476_2.png) [@BartButenaers](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/BartButenaers)\
**Post date:** [1 May 2019 07:13 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/announce-node-red-contrib-msg-toggle-feedback-request/10705/1 "2019-05-01T07:13:23Z")

</div>

Hi folks,

First my apologies to everybody waiting for developments on my other nodes, but have not much time and this one was just to much fun creating it ...

There was a nice proposal from @Steve-Mcl last week (see [discussion](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/how-to-comment-out-a-node/1106/18)) to have an inline clickable message switch. Had been playing with a similar idea some time ago, but had no idea to implement it at the time being.

So I implemented now the [node-red-contrib-msg-toggle](https://github.com/bartbutenaers/node-red-contrib-msg-toggle) which allows me to easily test some of my other new developments. It is a simple checkbox that you can use to turn on/off message passing through at runtime (so no deploy required):

 ![toggle_msg_demo](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/uploads/nodered/original/2X/0/09847b41ffe4d12eeb9bfddb94506ef9a96e350e.gif)

If you want to test it, you can install it directly from my Github repository:

```auto
npm install bartbutenaers/node-red-contrib-msg-toggle

```

As usual all '_constructive_' feeback is very welcome! I assume some people won't like this node, but I would appreciate not having discussions here about 'why' I implemented this node. I am aware that the flow editor isn't a dashboard, I am aware that this can be implemented with a combination of other nodes, I am aware that Node-RED APIs might change in the future, ... Would be nice to have feedback on how I could improve my node further.

P.S. The thing I don't like about my implementation, is the fact that I had to use a **DOM observer** 🥴 Not a good solution, but I needed to have a reference to the DOM element, as soon as the node had been added to the flow editor (to be able to add my checkbox to it). However in the [nodes:add](https://github.com/node-red/node-red/wiki/Design:-Editor-Events) the node hasn't been added to the SVG already, and I have no _nodes:added_ event aferwards. If anybody has a better solution, please give me the golden tip!

Have fun with it !!  
Bart

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**Author:** ![bakman2](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/bakman2/32/6207_2.png) [@bakman2](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/bakman2)\
**Post date:** [1 May 2019 11:29 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/announce-node-red-contrib-msg-toggle-feedback-request/10705/2 "2019-05-01T11:29:33Z")

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Correct me if i'm wrong; the discussion was about a passthrough of the message (ie. ignore the node), don't know if that makes a difference for your node, but it requires a different/overall implementation.

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**Author:** ![BartButenaers](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/bartbutenaers/32/10476_2.png) [@BartButenaers](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/BartButenaers)\
**Post date:** [1 May 2019 12:10 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/announce-node-red-contrib-msg-toggle-feedback-request/10705/3 "2019-05-01T12:10:20Z")

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Hi @bakman2,  
No you are right. The overal discussion was about ignoring nodes. But one of the side ideas was an extra switch you could insert. And in case I have interpreted that incorrectly, it was on my TODO list anyway so here it is ...

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**Author:** ![knolleary](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/knolleary/32/3_2.png) [@knolleary](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/knolleary)\
**Post date:** [1 May 2019 12:34 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/announce-node-red-contrib-msg-toggle-feedback-request/10705/4 "2019-05-01T12:34:37Z")

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> [@BartButenaers](#):
>
> Would be nice to have feedback on how I could improve my node further.

Regardless of the merits of the functionality, customising the appearance of the node like that is **completely unsupported**.

We reserve the right to change how the drawing code works at any time without worrying about it breaking things like this.

Breaking changes are likely to happen in 1.0 as we change the underlying CSS structure of the whole editor to tidy it up.

As for the functionality, let me repeat what I said in the previous thread:

> [@How to comment out a node?](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/how-to-comment-out-a-node/1106/43):
>
> We have no precedent for having a node in the middle of a flow that has a button or state that can be toggled in the editor without a deploy. The UI design work to get that right is not trivial.
> 
> I understand what functionality you want. I'm not ignoring it. But I do have to align it with work we already have underway and work we have planned.
> 
> Further down the line we have plans for a flow debugger (after 1.0 ships). I would not want to rush something in now that introduces new UI concepts at this stage of getting to 1.0, particularly when it overlaps with a whole area of functionality we want to focus on later this year.

None of that has changed in the four days since I posted it.