Skip to content

IPC handlers registered before devtron.install() receive wrapped payloads instead of original arguments #314

@trungutt

Description

@trungutt

Describe the bug

When devtron.install() is called after other libraries have already registered IPC handlers via ipcMain.handle(), those pre-existing handlers receive devtron's wrapped payload object { __uuid__devtron, args } instead of the original arguments.

This is because:

  1. Devtron's patchIpcMain() replaces ipcMain.handle with a wrapper that calls getArgsFromPayload() to unwrap arguments
  2. However, handlers registered before patchIpcMain() was called are using the original ipcMain.handle, so they never go through the unwrapping logic
  3. Meanwhile, devtron's renderer-preload always wraps ipcRenderer.invoke calls with the { __uuid__devtron, args } payload format

To Reproduce

  1. Register an IPC handler before devtron is installed:
// Early in app initialization
ipcMain.handle('my-channel', (event, methodName, ...args) => {
  console.log('methodName:', methodName); // Expects a string like 'doSomething'
});

2. Install devtron later (e.g., after app.whenReady()):
app.whenReady().then(async () => {
  const { devtron } = await import('@electron/devtron');
  await devtron.install();
});

3. From the renderer, invoke the channel:
ipcRenderer.invoke('my-channel', 'doSomething', { data: 'test' });

4. Expected: methodName is 'doSomething'
5. Actual: methodName is { __uuid__devtron: '...', args: ['doSomething', { data: 'test' }] }

Real-world example

This breaks @bugsnag/electron which registers IPC handlers during module initialization (before devtron can be installed). When calling bugsnag.notify() from the renderer, the main process logs:

[BUGSNAG] attempted to call IPC method named "[object Object]" which doesn't exist

And Bugsnag is initialized before everything else in an Electron app, to catch as many as possible bugs.

Suggested solutions

  1. Patch existing handlers - When patchIpcMain() is called, retroactively wrap any handlers that were already registered with the unwrapping logic.

OR

  1. Channel exclusion list - Allow users to specify channels that should be excluded from devtron's payload wrapping:
    devtron.install({
    excludeChannels: ['bugsnag::renderer-to-main', 'bugsnag::renderer-to-main-sync']
    });

Metadata

Metadata

Assignees

No one assigned

    Labels

    No labels
    No labels

    Type

    No type

    Projects

    No projects

    Milestone

    No milestone

    Relationships

    None yet

    Development

    No branches or pull requests

    Issue actions