Looking for a Related Links Plugin

Hey everybody!

I’m looking for a plugin to do something in particular. I don’t know that I could write something like this myself – I don’t have the time to delve (nor do I have the advanced PHP I think I would need) into creating a plugin like this. If anyone has any suggestions, or knows where I can find some help on this, I’d really appreciate it.

I’m currently using Manual Related Links. While on the front end I have it doing exactly what I want, it’s the back-end I’d like to operate differently.

What I’m looking for is a way to select up to (X number – in my case, 6) links to add into a ‘worth checking out’ section in my sidebar on a post by post basis. I’d like to be able to add them from a category in my ‘links’ section of the dashboard, (i.e. ‘External Links’), with a selectable box available somewhere in the ‘add/edit’ post page, in a similar way that you select which categories a post is in.

Now, I think this should be relatively feasible – The Manual Related Links plugin is able to do the post by post basis and make it available in in the add/edit post page. The Links section allows me to add the link, an icon, and all the information I want to add about a link, and keep it in a database in case I want to reference it for multiple posts. And there’s a function that will list and check things like the categories list….

I hope I’ve articulated what I’m looking for properly. So… help please! I’m not in any rush to do this – if I don’t find any help in here, I’ll attempt it myself. But I really hope there’s someone out there with a better grasp at PHP that has already taken a crack at something like this!