Metadata Block

The metadata block is a section of a user script that does not execute any code, but describes the script. It contains the script name, namespace, description, and include and exclude rules.

The metadata block appears in JavaScript comments. It begins with the line

// == UserScript==

and ends with

// == /UserScript==

Everything between those lines is in the format

// @key   value

If the metadata block includes a key that Greasemonkey does not understand, it will simply be ignored.

Metadata keys

@name

The name of the script. This appears in the script manager and monkey menu, and is also used to determine whether to overwrite an old version of a script or to install it separately. If no name is provided, it will be inferred from the file name.

@namespace

The namespace, along with the name, is used to determine whether to overwrite an old version of a script or to install it separately. A script author will usually put all of their scripts under one common namespace, and then assign each script a unique name. If two scripts have the same name, but a different namespace, they can co-exist. However, two scripts of the same name in the same namespace are assumed to be replacements for one another. While the namespace is non-semantic, it should be a URI. If no namespace is provided, it is assumed to be the domain from which the script is installed. Since a script can live on various servers or on a local file system, authors should specify this.

@description

Just a description.

@include and @exclude

Refer to Include and exclude rules. There can be any number of @include and @exclude rules in a script.

Example

// ==UserScript==
// @name          My Script
// @namespace     http://www.example.com/gmscripts/
// @description   Scripting is fun
// @include       http://www.example.com/*
// @include       http://www.example.org/*
// @exclude       http://www.example.org/foo
// ==/UserScript==

Other Keys

Some user scripts contain other keys in the metadata block. Common keys are @author, @version, or @homepage. These metadata keys serve no technical purpose. They are ignored by the Greasemonkey extension, but they can be read by human beings or other code.

Caveats

Changing the metadata of an installed script does not do anything, as this data is only accessed during installation. The script must be re-installed for these changes to take. Alternatively, config.xml can be modified manually.