Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
IV
Plug-ins make your blog stand out and help to define the kinds of things you care about in your
blog. Because they are completely optional bits of code and functionality, you can choose exactly
which plug-ins you want on your blog, and where existing functionality is good enough.
In this chapter, we help you sort out the differences between plug-ins and widgets, find appropri-
ate plug-ins for your site, and give you a sense of the variety of plug-ins out there.
There are plenty of “essential WordPress plug-ins” lists on the Web, but what is essential for one
WordPress user might be thoroughly useless for another. The people who decide what's really
essential are the WordPress development team, as many bits of plug-in code have been incorpo-
rated into the WordPress core. Meanwhile, open source software generally, and WordPress in par-
ticular, is about having choices. Have fun with your choices.
Defining a Plug-In
WordPress is not alone when it comes to allowing plug-ins to coexist with its own software. The
famous iPhone App Store is nothing but a plug-in repository for the iPhone (and iPod Touch) soft-
ware. When you install the Mozilla Firefox web browser, you are soon invited to install a batch
of recommended
extensions
to the browser that enhance your experience or give you added
functionality.
To clear up one possible area of confusion: Plug-ins and wid-
gets have a fairly organic connection, but they are not the
same thing. Widgets are usually part of a theme's sidebar or
footer, and, like plug-ins, add functionality to a standard
WordPress blog page. All of the following statements are true:
•
Plug-ins can create widgets. Widgets cannot create
plug-ins.
•
Widgets are always components of themes. Plug-ins can
be a theme component, but can also work directly with
WordPress core.
•
Widgets can be used on WordPress.com. Plug-ins cannot
be used directly, but it's often easy for a developer to con-
vert a plug-in into a widget that does the same thing.
•
Widgets are always items displayed on your page; plug-
ins can appear in the Administration page, on one or more
pages, or work completely behind the scenes.
note
Firefox is very popular with the
open source community because of
its extensibility. If you go to Tools,
Add-ons in Firefox, you'll see sepa-
rate tabs for Extensions and Plug-
ins. In Firefox, a plug-in is
something that allows other appli-
cations installed on your computer
desktop (including various media
players, Adobe Reader, Flash, and
Shockwave) to work inside the
browser. Extensions add different
types of functionality. Because
WordPress exists on a web server, it
doesn't need to work with desktop
applications. So when you think
about WordPress plug-ins in rela-
tion to Firefox, think extensions.
One final way to think of the differences between widgets
and plug-ins: Widgets are always about enhancing the visi-
tor's experience on your site; that's why they are always visible. Plug-ins can focus on user experi-
ence, but also make things easier on you as the blogger and administrator of your site.
