10 Qualities to look for in a WordPress Plugin

I have been using WordPress as a blogging platform for almost three years and during this time I have tried and tested hundreds of plugins. Many fall by the wayside almost instantly but others manage to stick around and become part of my WordPress arsenal.

Although I have never released a plugin to the public, I have managed to develop a couple which I use privately on this blog. Plugins have been a major contributor in maintaining and evolving my interest and curiosity in WordPress as a Blogging platform and Content Management System (CMS) for developing websites.

Plugins are tools that essentially extend the functionality of WordPress. The core of WordPress is designed to be lean, to maximise flexibility and minimise code bloat. Plugins offer custom functions and features so that each user can tailor their site to their specific needs. Think of a Plugin as a function or feature that you can just “bolt on” to your site and there are literally thousands available for free to the  public.

Although I’m not a hotshot web designer (yet!) nor an expert in PHP, CSS, HTML and JavaScript – the building blocks of web design, I do have over 25 years of professional experience in the design, building and implementation of Information Systems. I suppose you could say that I have developed a sixth sense for being able to gauge what is a quality and what is not. In this post I would like to share some of this experience with you in the form of a list of “10 Things” which IMHO make a top notch WordPress Plugin.

Here goes…

1. Continuity: the plugin author is committed and continues to maintain his or her plugin as newer versions of WordPress are developed,tested and released, ideally adapting their code during Alpha, Beta and Release Candidates of the WordPress core.




2. Documentation: a quality plugin will have clear and easy to follow notes on how to use the full set of features. This doco can be part of the plugin’s Readme.txt file, available on the WordPress Plugin page or on the Author’s website (or all three). Doesn’t matter where as long as it exists. It’s also a bonus when the author has made ample use of comments within his or her code.




3. Standards: adheres to WordPress coding and versioning standards (Code is Poetry). Up until recently it was quite difficult to find a Changelog for many plugins when a newer version of the plugin was released – this has become easier although many plugin developers have not yet caught up with this requirement. Another aspect of standards implies that the plugin code should pass HTML and CSS validation. In my opinion this is where many plugins fall short. Perhaps WordPress could make it a requirement that a plugin must validate before it is accepted into the public repository.




4. Interaction: this is a big one for me – the plugin author must interact with the user community. This is normally done via the WordPress Forums or a Forum that the author him or herself has setup. The tone, frequency and mood of the author towards his or her users will determine whether the plugin gains momentum or it just dies a natural death.




5. Responsive: the author must respond to plugin related issues as they are raised – preferably within a day or so. The quality and frequency of the author’s response to tickets raised on the Forum(s) are essential. Failure to do so will surely see a quick demise of his or her work.




6. Licensing: in the true spirit of WordPress and Open Source Software (OSS) the plugin must be GPL licensed. Purchased plugins – although I’m sure there’s a market out there for such a product – in essence goes against the philosophy and spirit of WordPress. Having said that I’m totally for the idea if the author decides to charge a joining fee to access  the plugin forum (so long as the plugin is stable and runs reliably on the current version of WP of course).




7. Support: the author maintains some form of ticketing system for bugs or enhancements. If these tickets can be accessed and viewed by the public all the better but not essential. As bugs are reported and enhancements requested we really do need to see proactive involvement by the author.




8. Function: the plugin must fulfil a useful role. There’s many plugins around that do something that just takes a few lines of code in the “functions.php” – to me these have no place whatsoever in my bloggers toolkit. There are also those that aim to do almost everything – these end up failing somewhere along the line due to the large number of moving parts and high degree of complexity. A plugin must fulfil a clear, useful and functional role.




9. User Interface: the plugin must be easy to use and come with a user interface that slots nicely into the WordPress way of doing things. The layout of configuration panels, colours and naming conventions used all contribute to the quality of a plugin. If some options or settings are only available via the PHP code of the plugin itself – then this needs to be well documented. It’s also handy when the syntax and parameters of associated template tags are documented in the User Interface.




10. Loyalty: needs to have a loyal user base. From experience users will assist – with debugging, testing and reporting problems – wherever and whenever they can. The degree of user loyalty is of course directly proportional to the energy that the author puts into their “creation”. With several plugins that I use, the user base actually contributes enhancements by way of code with the new features then included in the next release of the plugin. A strong and loyal user base will also help out the author by responding to topics and enquiries raised on the plugin’s forum.

Finally, here’s a list of several resources which might come in handy if you are just starting out with WordPress:

• WordPress.org
• WordPress.com
• WordPress Plugin Repository
• Plugin Development resources
• Wordpress Cheat Sheet (389.89 KB)
• A list of Plugins used on this Blog