How deep the changes in the API should be?

14.8% 18
13.9% 17
13.9% 17
57.4% 70

122 Datum 20. April 2009, 03:09

Foren / Cotonti / Core Labs / Archive / Umfrage: Plugin API changes

How far can we go?

Trustmaster
#11622 20. April 2009, 14:16
Not very much information on designs unless we are pretty sure how much backwards compatibility we want.

Brand new - is likely to be new plugin abstracts, reviewing everything on what plugins are. I haven't thought what it could be. Just means that no old plugins will work at all.

Major upgrade is most likely to be based on callback functions. So every plugin part will be a function. You can bind it as a handler for several events at a time (aka hooks). When a module is run, it preloads plugin includes so all necessary callbacks are compiled and binded. A hook calls the callbacks due to their order. Most changes inside of the plugins are related to making them functions, meaning also that they will need to access global variables explicitly.

Minor update is about adding extra functionality without changing the concept of plugin parts (which will stay as includes). Just extend sed_plugins to bind the same part to several hooks, improve auth handling and implement a few other requested features. There still be changes in plugins, but most of old code will work.

I just want to warn that if you vote for "Brand new" or "Major upgrade" that would mean that old plugins will need some work. I'm not sure there will be enough enthusiasts to do it.
May the Source be with you!