Hello World plugin

This tutorial will show how to create a simple plugin. We will create a plugin "Hello World", that belongs to group of plugins "Examples".

Step 1 - create folder structure

First of all we need to create a folders "examples" and "hello_world" in "ip_plugins" folder like that:

...
ip_libs
ip_plugins

examples

hello_world

ip_themes
...

Step 2 - create manager class

In "hello_world" folder create "manager.php" file. This file is executed when we open a plugin tab in administration area.

Put this content to "manager.php" file:

<?php      
      
namespace Modules\examples\hello_world; //"examples" and "hello_world" should exactly match your folder names.      
      
if (!defined('BACKEND')) exit; //this file can be acessed only in backend      
      
class Manager{ //don't change this line.      
      
  function manage() { //this function is executed every time, when plugin tab is opened. This function should return plugin management HTML.      
    return 'Hello World';      
  }      
}

Step 3 - preapre for installation

In "hello_world" folder create "install" subfolder and place "plugin.ini" file with content:

version:1.00

module_title:Hello World

module_key:hello_world

module_group_title:Examples

module_group_key:examples

module_managed:1

module_key and module_group_key should match folder names that were created in step 1.

module_managed configuration value tells the system that this module have a management area (if set to 1). Set it to 0 if your plugin don't need a tab in administration area.

If your plugin requires another plugin to be installed first, add this line at the bottom:

required_module:plugin_group/plugin/1.00

Step 4 - installation

Login to administration area, go to tab "Developer->Modules" and press "install". Then refresh browser (press F5) and you will see new tab "Examples". Press it and then press "Hello World". You should see a text "Hello World" on your screen.

Download

You can download this example as an archive. Upload folder "examples" to folder "ip_plugins" on your server and execute actions described in step 4.

ip_plugin_examples_hello_world_1_00.zip