[wp-hackers] Plugin dependency checking

[Mike Schinkel]

On Jun 17, 2009, at 9:07 AM, scribu wrote:
> On 6/17/09, Mike Schinkel <mikeschinkel at newclarity.net> wrote:
>> But the problem again is what happens when two different plugins  
>> define the
>> same interface differently? That's where the registry comes in. The  
>> function
>> 'akismet_define_interface' would NEVER be called if it is defined  
>> in the
>> registry, so plugin devs would be forced to ensure their definition  
>> would
>> match the one in the registry (which is a good thing.) OTOH if a  
>> developer
>> is developing locally with no Internet connection, or the registry  
>> web
>> service was down, WP could fall back to the local definition.
>
> For now, I'd just like to say that having to call a remote registry
> for each plugin, on each page load, by default, is a *very* bad idea.

Agreed. But I was not proposing that. I was only proposing a call to a  
registry once upon plugin activation.

One call to a web service with a list of of plugins on activation that  
returns a list of registered interfaces is certainly not a legitimate  
performance concern for clients or for the server, right?

-Mike Schinkel
WordPress Custom Plugins
http://mikeschinkel.com/custom-wordpress-plugins/