[Bf-committers] Some ideas to improve the "Add-Ons" section

Jass gaia.clary at machinimatrix.org
Sun May 15 13:45:25 CEST 2011


Hi.

Right now Blender add-ons can only be installed and
activated/deactivated. I propose to add 4 more features:


============================================================
Feature 1: Allow for deinstalling a deactivated module.
============================================================

Sometimes i install something to test it, but later decide
to remove it again. In that case i also want to scratch it
completely from my Blender. I know that i simply can go to
the application-data folder and remove the addon from there.
But i think, this is an inconvenient way to proceed.


============================================================
Feature 2: Add an "update" button in the module descriptor:
============================================================

Right now the Module descriptor contains 2 buttons:

   - Link to the Wiki
   - Report a Bug

What about adding a third button:

   - Check for Update

When clicked,  a URL is called (defined in the module) which returns
the newest available version of the module. If the returned version
matches the installed version, then display:

   "your module is up to date"

otherwise change the button to:

   - Update to version x.y.z"

If user clicks on the update button, the module gets updated from
the update-URL (which is also defined in the module). The update URL
should be allowed to contain cgi-parameters (http-GET request).


============================================================
Feature 3: Allow to add module customization parameters
============================================================

The module descriptor could offer the possibility to add some module
specific customization informations. So a module could add a list of
entry fields (checkmarks/buttons/text fields) to the descriptor.

And the user can fill/change the data and the module can use that data
to control its runtime features (like enable only parts of the module
or whatever)


============================================================
Feature 4: Allow for updating instead of reinstalling  a module.
============================================================

An addOn module might also contain a "customer area" which may be
modified (implicitly through the module activities) by the users.
When we deliver a new version of the module, then at the moment
any old configuration/customization would get lost.

IMHO the simplest way to solve this:

Put all customer data to a "module custom area" which remains
unchanged when a module is reinstalled.  And add an API to that
data so that a module can access this information safely.

Maybe such a feature already exists?
Then where can i find the API to access/maintain it ?


Cheers,
Gaia



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