Title: Plugin development — did Imiss something?
Last modified: August 19, 2016

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# Plugin development — did Imiss something?

 *  [baysoftware](https://wordpress.org/support/users/baysoftware/)
 * (@baysoftware)
 * [16 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/plugin-development-did-imiss-something/)
 * Hi everyone,
 * I’m trying to add a component I wrote to WordPress as a plugin/widget. I’ve been
   going through the Codex and so far everything seems pretty straightforward…define
   the PHP header, define the functions, and then hook them in using add_filter 
   or add_action. I followed the instructions and managed to install and register
   my basic, functionless widget. At this point, however, the Codex just stops dead.
 * The actions listed don’t include a awful lot of detail; the parameters are *very*
   briefly mentioned (what about type? sample data?), return data is often not mentioned
   at all, and all of the actions/filters link to a blank page (“There is currently
   no text in this page.”) In some cases, it’s almost impossible to figure out what
   they’re supposed to do (e.g. function parameter is “array of comment information
   structures” … what is this? where is it documented?)
 * Obviously people are writing plugins and widgets, but where are they getting 
   the information to do this? I downloaded a few widgets and tried to look up the
   actions/filters they hook into and, in about 60% of the cases, the search on 
   WordPress.org returned no results (even a number of the “typical request” actions
   listed on the Action Reference — [http://codex.wordpress.org/Plugin_API/Action_Reference](http://codex.wordpress.org/Plugin_API/Action_Reference)—
   don’t seem to exist anywhere on WordPress.org).
 * What am I missing?
 * Thanks for your help!

Viewing 1 replies (of 1 total)

 *  [plug_n_author](https://wordpress.org/support/users/plug_n_author/)
 * (@plug_n_author)
 * [16 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/plugin-development-did-imiss-something/#post-1215294)
 * The codex is near worthless for authoring plugins. Hopefully you know how to 
   use the command line. Under Windows, I use ‘findstr /sic:”somethingtosearchfor”*’(
   without the surrounding quotes) to search the entire WordPress source code for
   something along the lines of what I’m looking for. You really end up winging 
   it. Obviously, you will come to the same conclusion I have – WordPress is a hack
   and is a miracle it works at all. Unfortunately, WordPress is the best blogging
   software out there. That says to me there is significant room for improvement
   and is still really anyone’s game.
 * No one really wanders this forum – you’re lucky I came along.
 * As far as plugin authoring, you really are on your own. You have to have pretty
   in-depth PHP skills and former plugin authoring experience with other, more documented
   products, to author a plugin for WordPress that isn’t riddled with security holes.
   The plugin infrastructure in WordPress qualifies as decent – not the worst, but
   hardly the best.

Viewing 1 replies (of 1 total)

The topic ‘Plugin development — did Imiss something?’ is closed to new replies.

## Tags

 * [code](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/code/)
 * [Coding](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/coding/)
 * [development](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/development/)
 * [php](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/php/)
 * [widget](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/widget/)

 * 1 reply
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [plug_n_author](https://wordpress.org/support/users/plug_n_author/)
 * Last activity: [16 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/plugin-development-did-imiss-something/#post-1215294)
 * Status: not resolved

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