[wp-hackers] Plugin Framework

[Stephen O'Connor]

Sadly, you are right. It is "geared towards evil nasty database and/or file
modifying plugins". In my next version the file-editing specific features
will be gone. A plugin-author could still code a file-editing plugin but the
framework will no longer cater to them.

But some plugins need to edit database tables or files. Think of the
convenience a plugin would have if it automatically updated your .htaccess
file, for example.

As far as helping plugin writers work with the APIs, I'm not exactly sure
what you mean. If you mean the plugin APIs, then I honestly don't see any
room for improvement on my end. :(

Okay, and your improvement requests:

1) [config-handler] Why would you want configuration files? You know there's
a perfectly good MySQL database handy - just import the $wpdb object (they
even set up an appendable "options" table). Besides, any config files may
contain sensitive info which might be a security risk.
2) [plugin-gui] The gui front end is already in place, it was an original
goal of the project. Simply define a method main() for the plugin, and that
method will be executed in a wp-admin page after plugin installation.
3) [extra admin objects via DOM] I really like this idea. Any utility which
assists here will certainly restrict the plugin author's freedom, but I
think they might appreciate the convenience. If not they could just code
their own and not use the framework's. ;)

One interesting side effect of this framework is the title "plugin" doesn't
adequately describe some of them. By simply defining a gui with some
back-end coding and not letting any code be included by WP, it's possible to
create WordPress "applications" or "executables". I've created several small
utility programs for tasks like database viewing/editing and plugin
troubleshooting.

- Stephen

-----Original Message-----
From: hackers-bounces at wordpress.org
[mailto:hackers-bounces at wordpress.org]On Behalf Of Jason goldsmith
Sent: Monday, June 21, 2004 2:12 AM
To: hackers at wordpress.org
Subject: Re: [wp-hackers] Plugin Framework


It looks ok, but it seems like it is geared towards evil nasty
database and/or file modifying plugins. I'd prefer to see a plugin
framework that helped plugin writers work with the existing APIs.

Three things I would need to see in a framework to make it worthwhile to me
are

1) Configuration handler, so I can easily create config files for
plugins and work with them
2) A GUI front end for configuration files (probably showing up as a
link reading "Configure" in the plugin admin interface plugin
description field
3) Utility functions that help hack around the places where the WP API
is weak like inserting GUI elements into the post.php screen via
JavaScript and the DOM.

I can help with #3 now, at least by providing some hax0red code that I
have. It ins't perfect, but it isn't terrible. I have to deal with #1
and #2 in the next few weeks, so I will probably have some code for
those as well that you can start with if you are interested.

On Fri, 18 Jun 2004 03:02:25 -0400, Stephen O'Connor
<steve at stevarino.com> wrote:
>
> > Oh, you too? That'll teach me not to announce things :(
>
> Haha! I would be interested in comparing code and techniques. Maybe we
could
> learn something?
>
> - Stephen
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: hackers-bounces at wordpress.org
> [mailto:hackers-bounces at wordpress.org]On Behalf Of Kitty
> Sent: Friday, June 18, 2004 2:59 AM
> To: hackers at wordpress.org
> Subject: Re: [wp-hackers] Plugin Framework
>
> Oh, you too? That'll teach me not to announce things :(
>
> On Thu, 2004-06-17 at 23:37, Stephen O'Connor wrote:
> > Hey!
> >
> > Made a plugin framework.
> --
> Kitty <kitty at mookitty.co.uk>
> http://mookitty.co.uk/devblog/
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> hackers mailing list
> hackers at wordpress.org
> http://wordpress.org/mailman/listinfo/hackers_wordpress.org
>

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