I can be pretty obscure!
Well, when plugin developers write functions as part of their plugins, or add database tables etc, they need to know whether a previous plugin might have written that table or declared that function in order to prevent serious breakage. This person has started to develop a framework to support future development in the “click” area.
Craig,
What I’ve tried to do with CMC is unify the whole click-counter genre of plugins. Why? Because there are so many possible ways of displaying the stats but very few ways to generate them. I thought that if I could create the perfect click counter to generate the stats, other plugins could specialize in displaying those stats: in text (a la Ozh’s ClickCounter), as graphical meters (see my sidebar for that one), as varying text sizes (like Flickr’s list of tags), or anything else you can think of.
If each of these plugins kept its own private stats table, the server would be doing a lot of extra work, as would the developers. CMC does the one thing that all click-statistics plugins have in common and because it focuses on only counting clicks, it does it very well. I hope is explains it.
An avid fan of business, education, technology and finance. I lead a lean, highly focussed and capable team of Java Back End developers and Front End developers through a maze of complex software wizardry to fulfill the web maintenance needs of a large chemical manufacturer. As per Myers-Briggs Personality Types, I am an ESTJ. I pride in a project completed on time and according to plan. My hobbies include all kinds of technology, anything that I can taste and anything that goes fast or flies in the air. I like to read business books and comics in my spare time.
Mark,
Could you post a translation for this so us simpletons can understand what you are saying? Thanks! :p
I can be pretty obscure!
Well, when plugin developers write functions as part of their plugins, or add database tables etc, they need to know whether a previous plugin might have written that table or declared that function in order to prevent serious breakage. This person has started to develop a framework to support future development in the “click” area.
Craig,
What I’ve tried to do with CMC is unify the whole click-counter genre of plugins. Why? Because there are so many possible ways of displaying the stats but very few ways to generate them. I thought that if I could create the perfect click counter to generate the stats, other plugins could specialize in displaying those stats: in text (a la Ozh’s ClickCounter), as graphical meters (see my sidebar for that one), as varying text sizes (like Flickr’s list of tags), or anything else you can think of.
If each of these plugins kept its own private stats table, the server would be doing a lot of extra work, as would the developers. CMC does the one thing that all click-statistics plugins have in common and because it focuses on only counting clicks, it does it very well. I hope is explains it.