Help Developing Plugin

michaelcrinnion
(@michaelcrinnion)

21 years ago

Ok… so… I have no previous expeience with developing plugins, I DO have experience of website design in HTML and CSS and I’ve learnt small amounts of PHP principles whilst cretaing and maintining my blog at http://blog.crin.co.uk

What I’m looking to create is a plugin that will allow me to create, update and maintain an index of my vinyl 12″ collection. I want to be able to input new records as I get them through some sort of Admin page and then I want the output to be formatted, and organised in alphabetical order. I’d also like records under a couple of week sold to be indicated as new.

Now… I’m prepared to do this myself and hopefully learn a bit in the process but I’d like some advice on the best/most efficient way to go about this project. Any and all advice would be very much appreciated!!!

Thanks for your time in advance!! 😀

Crin.

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

Noemi Nozze
(@mcmike)

21 years ago

what you want to do is probably make this database-supported so you need mysql-knowledge as well (text files just don’t cut it)

What you want to do in short is focus on the admin tool..
The output in the weblog is fairly simple, just get the info from DB and echo’it

But the admin function is needed for a good structure, you can make it fairly simple. Check out my (just wrote) Quote of the Day plugin (http://www.mcmike.nl/qotd.zip)

In this plugin there are 2 functions:
1) output the quotes on the weblog
2) Admin functions for WP-Admin
The admin functions control is somewhat what you would want:
Add, Edit and Delete mysql entries…..

I reckon this could be a nice hand-out / start out since this is a very simple script.

If you have any questions mail me@mcmike.nl for more support or post here 🙂 I try to check this every xx hours…

dave_merwin
(@dave_merwin)

21 years ago

You would also do well to look in the codex. I have done some plugin dev, and I am working on a couple now, so I have come to DEPEND on the documentation.

WordPress
The Codex:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Main_Page
Writing a Plug-in:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Writing_a_Plugin
Plug-in API:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Plugin_API

On the web
Tutorials:
http://www.randypeterman.com/wordpress/index.php?p=597
My ongoing discussion with way smarter people than myself:
http://www.designshanty.com/thebrain/index.php/WordPress_Plug-Ins

In my experience, very specific questions will get you better answers. General how-to questions require answers that are usually longer than most people have time to give.

isaacwedin
(@isaacwedin)

21 years ago

You could use List Manager Plugin:
http://www.navidazimi.com/projects/wp-lists/

Even if it won’t work as-is, it looks like a good place to start.