# Display HTML inside flow

**URL:** https://discourse.nodered.org/t/display-html-inside-flow/6586
**Category:** General
**Created:** [9 January 2019 04:39 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/display-html-inside-flow/6586 "2019-01-09T04:39:55Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![mvidhya86](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d78d45/32.png) [@mvidhya86](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/mvidhya86)
#### Post date: [9 January 2019 04:39 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/display-html-inside-flow/6586/1 "2019-01-09T04:39:55Z")

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Hello,

I'm trying to preview/display html file, is there an option to display this within flow something like a preview or a popup window in which we can show the html file contents. Please help

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### Author: ![ukmoose](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/ukmoose/32/13_2.png) [@ukmoose](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/ukmoose)
#### Post date: [9 January 2019 07:12 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/display-html-inside-flow/6586/2 "2019-01-09T07:12:28Z")

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the node-red canvas isn’t a dashboard, so there isn’t anyway of doing that currently.

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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: [9 January 2019 12:04 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/display-html-inside-flow/6586/3 "2019-01-09T12:04:09Z")

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Hi Vid,

Like @ukmoose already explained, the flow editor isn't a dashboard. So this kind of stuff isn't really encouraged. If you **really** need to show custom content, have a look at this [link](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/create-node-which-displays-input-message-content/3682/3?u=bartbutenaers). Some remarks:

- Also have a look at Nick's reply to that post: the used API is not public, so it might not work anymore in a future version!
- The node-red-contrib-image-output node displays it's own SVG content inside the SVG of the flow editor. So if you need to display HTML, I assume you might need something [this](https://bl.ocks.org/Jverma/2385cb7794d18c51e3ab). But I haven't tried this and I have no experience with it ...

Bart

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### Author: ![TotallyInformation](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex026/user_avatar/discourse.nodered.org/totallyinformation/32/31_2.png) [@TotallyInformation](https://discourse.nodered.org/u/TotallyInformation)
#### Post date: [11 January 2019 21:42 UTC](https://discourse.nodered.org/t/display-html-inside-flow/6586/4 "2019-01-11T21:42:33Z")

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My method is to create a simple custom HTTP in/out that injects the html.

```auto
http-in -> read-file -> template -> http-out

```

Then you have a simplistic web page previewer. Not hard to adjust things so that you can send the file name as a parameter (though be wary of security issues, don't try to expose this over the Internet!). Another parameter and simple flow would let you view the source rather than the preview.

Of course, you can configure Node-RED to serve everything from a folder statically as well so that's another option.
