[Geany-Devel] Adding a plugin

[Lex Trotman]

On 8 June 2013 20:31, Roger Booth <rbooth at kabooth.com> wrote:

>  On 06/08/2013 03:02 AM, Frank Lanitz wrote:
>
> On Sat, 08 Jun 2013 02:54:38 -0700
> Roger Booth <rbooth at kabooth.com> <rbooth at kabooth.com> wrote:
>
>
>  One thing I could ask for is a reference in the docs to where I can
> find the correspondence between api and abi. Maybe thats the wrong
> question, but anyway, how do i know which abi version I need? This is
> in regards to PLUGIN_VERSION_CHECK(xxx)
>
>  A lot of functions have a note at Geany's API documentation, since
> which version of Geany they are avaialble. E.g. Since: 0.16 at
> utils_str_casecmp().
> At http://wiki.geany.org/plugins/development/api-versions you can find
> also the connection between API and ABI as well as the corresponding
> Geany version.
>
> Cheers,
> Frank
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Devel mailing listDevel at lists.geany.orghttps://lists.geany.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/devel
>
>  I guess what I was asking for was a note in the docs that talk about
> writing plugins, and especially in the docs about PLUGIN_VERSION_CHECK()
> that points to where the programmer can read up on the connection between
> api and abi. Or at least how the programmer can find out the number.
>
> Its great that you tell me here, and I know that somewhere in my mail
> history I have the info as well, but wouldn't it be better to put the info
> at the location where it helps the the programmer that is about to add a
> PLUGIN_VERSION_CHECK() to a plugin? That was an issue for me, and adding
> the references to the location where I was looking would have helped me.
>
> But beyond that, let me understand. What I do when writing a plugin is I
> keep track of the least value of x.yy in "Since: x.yy" for every function I
> use from the Geany API. Then I look at the URL you listed to find x.yy and
> cross reference it to an abi number. And that abi number is the number I
> plug in to the PLUGIN_VERSION_CHECK() macro. Is that how this works? If
> that is so, again, maybe it would be nice to document the manual procedure
> programmers should follow.
>

It might be just a typo on your part, but it is the biggest A*P*I number
you get from the table that you plug into the version check.  You don't do
anything with the ABI number, its automatic.

Or to be more realistic, plug in the API number of the geany you are
developing your plugin against. If you are using a function that is too new
for the Geany you are using you will get a compilation error. So simply use
the oldest version of Geany you want the plugin to work for and sit back
and let the compiler take the strain :)

If you develop with a new version of Geany, then only when you are *sure*
your plugin is finished should you consider looking for the oldest version
of API that will work, therefore defining the oldest version of Geany that
will work.  But due to the unfortunate changes of ABI that have happened
every few versions, people will have to compile your plugin themselves to
use older Geany versions, so your audience is narrowed significantly (those
who use an older Geany but are willing to compile plugins).  It is not
possible to use a precompiled plugin with a version of Geany that has a
different ABI, even if the API is ok.


> Your initial post in this thread asked
>
>
>     Is there something that describes how to go about adding a plugin to
> geany-plugins?
>
> It sounded to me like you wanted to know about issues folks had writing
> plugins. Well, I'm listing issues I have had writing Geany plugins.
>

Actually I wanted to know how to add them to the g-p build system, rather
than just plugins in general, since I havn't done anything g-p before :)

Since various people claim its just copying the examples in the docs I'll
see tomorrow :)

But thanks for the feedback that it isn't clear how best to use the API/ABI
versions, thats the sort of info the experts need if they are to be able to
improve the docs.

Cheers
Lex

>
> _______________________________________________
> Devel mailing list
> Devel at lists.geany.org
> https://lists.geany.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/devel
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.geany.org/pipermail/devel/attachments/20130608/539b922c/attachment.html>