root/trunk/README.SIDEBARS

***THIS DOCUMENT IS OUT OF DATE***
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How to add a new sidebar plugin
===============================

1.  Decide on a name.  I'll refer to it as <name> below.

2.  Next, create the plugin's controller in
    components/plugins/sidebars/<name>_controller.rb.  Look at
    flickr_controller.rb for an example.  At a minimum, you need to
    define two methods: 

    * self.display_name.  This is the short name that shows up in
      title blocks in the sidebar admin UI.

    * self.description.  This is the description that shows up in the
      UI.

    If your plugin needs to save configuration options, then you'll
    need to add a 'configure' method as well, and possible a
    self.default_config method.  Follow the examples.

3.  Next, create the configuration page.  If your sidebar plugin
    doesn't need any configuration data, then you can skip this step.
    Otherwise create a file called 
    components/plugins/sidebars/<name>/configure.rhtml and
    put the form for configuring your plugin into the file.  See the
    existing examples for inspiration.  You'll need to include
    observe_form to get rails to save your data for you.

4.  Finally, create the plugin's content.  This is what is displayed
    when the sidebar is displayed in the blog.  Create a file called
    components/plugins/sidebars/<name>/content.rhtml and fill it up.
    Don't forget to include a <h3> header block.  Configuration data
    (if any) is available in @sb_config[<config name>]

That's it.  New components should be picked up automatically.  To
enable them, you'll need to use the sidebar tool in the admin page.