Thanks, all, for the feedback. @Nikolay: tags make sense and we can add. I think that in general the json could contain other fields (comments, notes, anything). The system itself really just needs name+version, with everything else as decoration or an enhancement to help searching. @Derek: I’ll see how it looks when I upload. For download, a single zip is certainly easier, and this is not hard to do as part of the server script to publish a repository. Just not sure if it is actually necessary for us. Thanks for the link to the kodi repository structure. @Michael: I think ‘module’ is the correct word (rather than ’script'. Let’s stick with that. I’ll work on this module side first, as I am not so familiar with the web extensions. The reason I suggested the ‘plugins’ directory (rather than ‘plugin’) was to allow us to move to this on an individual plugin basis. I’m not sure if that is necessary (we may instead be able to work off the existence of the json master file). I plan to try to make one plugin json and format first, then sort out the server side repository structure for that. Then we can review. Regards, Mark.
On 14 Jul 2020, at 7:45 PM, Michael Balzer <dexter@expeedo.de> wrote:
Mark,
full ack, has been on my list as well. I'll handle the web UI side.
I don't think we need to migrate/change the folder structure, we should be able to just add the meta data. I tried to define the structure to be usable as a public repository. Did I miss something?
Btw, I used the naming "module" plugins instead of "script" plugins, as web plugins also consist mostly of scripts. I thought that would clear things for users, but I'm not sure now.
Regarding the plugin structure and meta data, we should decide wether to split plugins into their elements or keep them bundled. You seem to opt for bundles ("web subdirectory"). I would second that, but we then need to take into account a plugin may consist of multiple module and/or web plugins (see Edimax plugin for an example). Normally it's just one module plugin, but we should not restrict the system in that way. So the JSON file should allow to define an array of plugin elements / options.
Currently there's a version on each element, and but we could/should simplify this to a central overall version for the plugin.
To automatically install plugins, the meta data also needs to define the types and default setups for web/frontend plugins.
Draft: edimax.json:
{ name: "edimax", title: "Edimax: Smart Plug Control", description: "Smart Plug control for Edimax models SP-1101W, SP-2101W et al", group: "Home Automation", info: "https://docs.openvehicles.com/en/latest/plugin/edimax/README.html" <https://docs.openvehicles.com/en/latest/plugin/edimax/README.html>, maintainer: "Michael Balzer <dexter@dexters-web.de> <mailto:dexter@dexters-web.de>", version: "2.1", prerequisites: ["ovms>=3.2.010"], elements: [{ type: "script", path: "edimax.js", name: "edimax" // optional, defaults to plugin name },{ type: "webpage", path: "edimax.htm", page: "/usr/edimax", label: "Edimax Smart Plug", menu: "Config", auth: "Cookie" },{ type: "webhook", path: "edimax-status.htm", page: "/status", hook: "body.post" }] }
A method to easily disable/enable installed plugins would also be nice, i.e. as subcommands "plugin disable" / "plugin enable".
Regards, Michael
Am 14.07.20 um 07:55 schrieb Mark Webb-Johnson:
I feel that our plugin system offers a missed opportunity. By making small extensions to available functionality, we can use this system to do so much - and with a much lower complexity and barrier to entry compared to C++ ESP IDF development.
There are a couple of things I would like to now do:
Implement a mechanism for plugins to directly extend the console command language (other than the current ’script exec PLUGIN.fn’).
Implement a plugin repository, and command line tools for managing plugins. We simply need to have a store and directory of available plugins, a way of searching/listing those, and a uniform way to install/remove plugins. Once this is done, perhaps someone can handle the web UI side of this, and perhaps that can even be done as a plugin :-)
I’m already working on #1. Just an extension to the existing script system to allow plugins to register commands, and to have the command register/deregister done automatically on plugin load/unload.
However, #2 is a little more tricky and I’m looking for feedback on the design of this. My idea is:
Store the plugins in a new github/openvehicles/Open-Vehicle-Monitoring-System-3/plugins folder. Eventually the /plugin folder will all be migrated to here.
Each plugin has a unique name; the directory in /plugins.
Within each plugin directory, there is a <name>.json file (JSON format) with defined tags to describe the plugin. If the plugin delivers a web extension, that is in the ‘web’ subdirectory. If the plugin delivered a script extension, that is in the ’script’ directory. Documentation (in rst format) is in the ‘docs' directory. The JSON file would need the following, at a minimum:
Name: The plugin ID Title: One line title Group: Group for the plugin Version: The version string of the plugin Description: Longer textual description of the plugin Prerequisites: Prerequisites to be checked (Each plugin installed provides name=version, the system provides system-level ones such as the version of firmware, and then the prerequisites is simple a list of <name><operator><version> as required)
We can automatically build the documentation, and list, for all plugins for our docs.openvehicles.com <http://docs.openvehicles.com/> (in a similar way to how it is done for /plugin now).
On a repository server, as part of a nightly build job, we can automatically build a single directory JSON file from the <name>,json descriptors. We can publish this, as well as a git export/checkout of the plugins, on a http download site.
On the module, we can store a list of repository servers (allowing the user to add/remove as they require).
Contributors/authors of plugins simply GitHub clone our repository, and issue pull requests as appropriate. They can also have their own private repository servers (just need to host the directory json file and associated code files) and add it to their modules.
The ‘plugin’ command tree on the module will provide commands for:
List installed repositories Add a new repository Remove a repository List installed plugins List/Search available plugins Install a plugin Remove a plugin Update a plugin
I would like to try to unify the web and script plugin systems a bit more closely. They are really two sides of the same coin (with some plugins providing both).
Does that make sense? Any suggestions/comments?
Regards, Mark.
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