Future of the `data` and `i18n` plugin types

Development Plugins
1

I am wondering how to best handle the current plugins that have types of “data” and “i18n”. Basically my questions are:

  1. Should molecules, crystals, and i18n remain plugins that are installable via the plugin manager?
  2. Do they get installed to the same directory as the other plugins or does Avogadro handle them specially?
  3. Since they are not written in Python at all, is it best to have data and i18n be plugin types – i.e. contrasting with pyscript, pypkg, pypixi, likely pybin in the future – because they are handled in a fundamentally different way?
  4. Does Avogadro need any metadata to use these plugins at runtime or is metadata only needed by the plugin installer?
2

No. I’m also inclined to drop the base input generators from the plugin list.

I added them because they could be updated more frequently than the releases. (And to provide more examples in the dialog.) But if we’re making releases 3 times a year, I’m not sure it’s worth it.

No, they just had metadata for the installer.

3

To clarify, the default generators would still be a plugin and structured as one, right? Just not available via the plugin index, but rather always bundled with the Avogadro executable by default?

4

Yes, exactly. If it starts getting updates faster than releases, maybe it makes sense to add it, but right now that doesn’t seem necessary.