eUpdate - Version Announcement System

A couple months ago I was talking about a plugin that will allow plugin developers to inform users of their plugins when a new version of their plugin is now available. Well I picked this project back up and it is now possible to use the this plugin like Windows Update. The user can now be informed of what the currently released version of the plugin is and then they can perform a one click upgrade. All of the plugin files on their server will then be updated directly on the server with no need for them to download more plugin files and reupload them etc (Unless you are adding images).
I have now released the beta version of the developers documentation for eUpdate so that you can have a look at it and start implementing it for your plugins. You can find it here.
IF you have any questions then do not hesitate to ask.
I did realise that I forgot to mention in the documentation that the client side of the plugin makes use of the php curl extension. If you are congused about everything I have said there then click on the link above and hopefully that should explain more.

Sound very much like my e_version plugin that I use for my plugins but much more complex. I'll take a look at that.

And my Update Checker plugin - which if probably very out of date now

One suggestion, and I haven't checked this - make sure that the site admin is fully aware what is going on and can turn this off for any plugin that might use it - I had this request from some people about update Checker as they did not want 'behind the scenes' requests going off to other websites without them knowing about it.

That's why mine is only done by a deliberate click on the "check for update button", I saw the threads you had regarding this Bugrain, you saved me some grief with that!

Blimey I really didn't check properly for this plugin Am gonna have to add a "shiny" factor to it!

Just to answer bugrain's point. The client side of the plugin is integrated within the plugin being monitored so it is the responsibility of the plugin developer to make the option to enable/disable eupdate available within their plugin. I realise that this is where an issue of security and trust come into the equation. In one respect there is a level of inbuilt security with using CURL. When I first did some testing with eUpdate I discovered that I didin't have CURL set up on my version of PHP. This broke all pages that made use of eUpdate functions. This means that the plugin must be distributed with eUpdate support "switched off" and activated at a later date if it's possible. If anyone has any ideas on how I can improve security in this respect I would appreciate any input.

Don't know much about CURL. Is it something that is normally turned off in PHP (it's not for my ISP)?

If it is, then many people will probably not be allowed to have it turned on if they use shared hosts. This might limit the audience for the plugin.

However, it may be a common extension, so then you'd be OK.

Hmm may have to do some research on that front. I don't suppose you could run a poll for me on this site?

Today I have managed to reach a major milestone in the development of eUpdate, which will hopefully be received as good news! I have just carried out the first live test of the plugin and certainly in my own personal case everything worked as planned and I was able to update a plugin on my website successfully through eUpdate. I am waiting for feedback from a few more people as to how everything goes but at the moment it is looking good! The eUpdate "core" plugin is nearly ready for release in an early form. I hasten to add that this will be an early version and hopefully will see some improvement as time goes on. Currently there is only support for editing your version update files by hand which could be slightly tedious for a bigger update. But I hope to create some file comparison tools that will enable you to automatically generate these files.
There is one major feature that I realised that I missed out in the creation of this plugin and that is the ability to upgrade from older versions of a plugin. By this I mean that if someone has a version of your plugin installed at version 0.1 and in the meantime you have gone from 0.1 to 0.1.1 to 0.2 the system will be able to look at the version definition for 0.2 and the plugin can be upgraded from 0.1 through to 0.1.1 then on to 0.2 in one button click without any problem. I then realised that this meant it is infact possible to download a whole plugin through the eUpdate system! So possibly slightly further down the line I envisage a "plugin delivery" system that sits inside your installation of e107 and you can pick the plugins that you want to install (Although I do realise this might make the peple at e107coders.org unhappy ).
I will also, for your enjoyment , have an updated version of the documentation released shortly.
So that's my brief update on how things are going and hopefully I have kept your interest going in this system and it won't just turn into a proof of concept.

Whot ? Normally turned off ? I really hope not, cause when you have no curl, you have no paypal payments.
So i really hope it is not true what you are saying here

At least i have seen a lot of zogo shop users crashing on a corrupt curl.

cURL should be on by default.