Prevent a tab in service cloud console from closing

Question

I need to prevent a tab from closing on a condition (not necessarily unsaved data). Is there something I can do with the result object or other API to call to prevent the tab from closing?

sforce.console.getFocusedSubtabId(function (result) { 
     if (result.id) { 
        sforce.console.addEventListener(sforce.console.ConsoleEvent.CLOSE_TAB, function (result) { // what to do here }, { tabId : result.id }); 
     }
}); 

Answer 1

You can use the setTabUnsavedChanges method to check for and indicate that a tab has unsaved changes.

Documentation.

Answer 2

In my opinion, Richard N. has probably the best answer for this.

Here's why:

Adding an event listener to the sforce.console.ConsoleEvent.CLOSE_TAB event will only allow you to get your listener called before the tab is closed. The tab will eventually closed irrespective of what you do in your callback.

By using setTabUnsavedChanges, you will allow a tab to enter a "dirty state", as shown by the * asterisk. A dirty state means that the tab has been edited. When closing the tab, an error message will be displayed, asking the user if they want to save the unsaved changes. As far as I know, we don't support changing the message in the dialog.

Hope that helps to clarify.