A long and stupid way to save GitHub issues in Word DOCX format

github_issues_to_docx.md

The long and stupid way is listed below, but hoping that someone has a way quicker and nicer solution. (Didn't have time to come up with a proper Node or Deno solution, so I spent better part of the day on this abomination.^quote)

1. "Install" GitHub CLI and Pandoc

   nix-shell -p gh pandoc
   

2. Export GitHub issues in JSON

   The minimum GitHub issue properties required in the JavaScript snippet below:

   gh issue list --json title,body,url,number
   

   Use this to see all available issue properties:

   gh issue list --json
   

   One can filter the issues too if needed:

   gh issue list --state open --label "for_stakeholders" --json title,body,url,number
   

3. Copy the terminal output from the previous step to the JavaScript console in Chrome Dev Tools:

   > issues = ...copy here...
   

4. On the same JavaScript console, copy and execute the following lines too:

   // https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5282228/how-to-include-javascript-file-or-library-in-chrome-console
   async function loadScript(url) {
     let response = await fetch(url);
     let script = await response.text();
     eval(script);
   }
   
   // Doesn't seem to work on the console without a top-level `await`
   await loadScript('https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/showdown/2.1.0/showdown.min.js');
   
   // Needed to convert Markdown to HTML; see https://github.com/showdownjs/showdown
   const mdConverter = new showdown.Converter();
   
   function issuesJSONToHTML(issues) {
   
       let h1 = document.createElement('h1');
       h1.textContent = "Lynx issues";
   
       let newBody = document.createElement('body');
   
       // Convert `issues` array JSON and put into `newBody`
       issues.
           // `gh` outputs issues in reverse chronological order
           reverse().
           map( (iss) => {
               let section = document.createElement('section');
   
               let title = document.createElement('h2');
                   title.innerHTML = `<a href="${iss.url}">#${iss.number} ${iss.title}</a>`;
               let body = document.createElement('p');
                   body.innerHTML = mdConverter.makeHtml(iss.body);
   
               section.appendChild(title);
               section.appendChild(body);
   
               return section;
           }).
           forEach( (iss) => { newBody.appendChild(iss); })
   
       // Replace the site where the console is open
       // (this is mostly for instant testing)
       document.head.innerHTML = '<meta charset="utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width" /><title>Lynx issues</title>';
       document.body.innerHTML = newBody.outerHTML;
   
       return document.documentElement.outerHTML;
   }

5. Copy the HTML document to the system clipboard from the JavaScript console

   copy(issuesJSONToHTML(issues))

6. Paste it into a text file (e.g., issues.html)

7. Convert the saved HTML file to a Word document on the terminal

   pandoc issues.html -o issues.docx