Widgets User Interface and API

By Andy

I don’t have a lot to tell you here but I wanted to give you a peek at the interface we’ve been developing for WordPress Widgets. It’s not final but it’s working and if I may be the first to say so, it’s damn sexy! Of the top four browsers, FF/IE/O8/Safari, I have coaxed the script to work nicely with three of them and Matt reports that it works in Safari on his new Intel Mac Mini. Here’s the screenshot:

Widgets Screenshot

This week should see the release of WordPress Widgets as a plugin for everyone to use and play with. As a result, you’re going to see new widgets flying out faster than you can catch them. The API has become a thing of power and simplicity, enabling developers to write new widgets in minutes. My favorite part is either the popup configuration forms like the del.icio.us box shown, which can be made with fewer than 20 lines of code, or the little buttons you click to pop the forms up.

One included widget is simply called Text. You can have as many as nine of these at a time and put whatever you want in them (if you have the unfiltered_html capability). Complex things like Flickr badges will be easiest to deploy into badges this way: just paste the code from Flickr into the popup form. Of course, if someone named Owen happened to write an AJAX flickr badge script generator, nobody would complain. ;-)

Also of great importance is the ease of integrating this plugin with existing themes. It’s about as much work as adding three template tags and I’ll be publishing the full directions soon. Most of the included widgets will work with any theme but some widgets, due to legacy code in template tags, which will be updated in WordPress 2.1, will not. Theme authors can override any built-in widget with their own version if they like.

I told you I didn’t have much to say and then I went and spilled all the beans. Of course, none of the above is true or final, so bear with us as we make it so.

17 Responses to “Widgets User Interface and API”

  1. Lee Kelleher Says:

    Good work Andy, looks exciting… Curious about the configuration optionsfor the ‘categories’ widget item. I’m hoping that this will allow me to customize the sort-order/hierarchy?

    I’ve actually written some code to do that, but was holding back to see if you guys had already done it… let me know if you want the code?

  2. Bill Brown Says:

    Looks nice!

  3. Johnny K – WordPress Widgets Says:

    [...] Hmm, very nice WordPress Widgets, handwritten sidebars will be a thing of the past! [...]

  4. WordPress Widgets at Binary Bonsai Says:

    [...] Update: Andy let’s us know there will be a plugin for this. If that’s the case, it might be a good idea for K2 to support that instead of a proprietary solution. [...]

  5. ceejayoz Says:

    Very cool! I’ll be keeping an eye out for it.

  6. Playing with Wordpress Widgets at jarkolicious Says:

    [...] Playing with WordPress Widgets Published March 13th, 2006 Tags: Asides, blogging, cms, Software, WordPress. Playing with WordPress.com Widgets. So this is what all the talk is about. WordPress is about to get even better. (2) [...]

  7. bOLT Says:

    Hi looks like a nice plugin, will download and install now!!

    tHx..!!


    Please see http://bolt.forced2play.com/bwd/

  8. Lorelle on WordPress » Playing with Wordpress.com New Sidebar Widgets Says:

    [...] There have been a few recent announcements about the WordPress.com Sidebar Widgets lately, especially from WordPress developer, Andy Skelton, and in the WordPress.com Blog, so what is all the fuss about? [...]

  9. Blogs: Finally, there is order in the Wordpress Universe | VentureFiles Says:

    [...] As I try and add nifty things to my blogs I have to play with the sidebar alot. Now, there is a cool new tool called WordPress.com Sidebar Widgets. They are from WordPress developer, Andy Skelton and they are a cool method of accessorizing your WordPress.com sidebar on WordPress Themes which permit such interaction. [...]

  10. aNieto2K | De todo un poco » Sidebar Widgets, lo nuevo de Wordpress Says:

    [...] Via Blogging Pro, descubro este interesante blog donde nos explican un nuevo sistema de modificación del sidebar de nuestros themes con javascript y ajax (¿como no?). La verdad es que tiene muy buena pinta. Con un simple movimiento de ratón arrastramos las opciones que queremos poner en nuestro sidebar y lo ordenamos en la formación que más nos convenza. El invento se llama Sidebar Widgets y parece que uno de los desarrolladores(Andy Skelton) ya había hablado del tema. [...]

  11. Michael Heilemann Says:

    This week should see the release of WordPress Widgets as a plugin for everyone to use and play with.

    So ehm.. What’s the plan? :)

  12. Ken Savage Says:

    Is there a WordPress widget repository anywhere yet?

  13. Listics - Frank Paynter’s Voice and Vision… » Widgets Says:

    [...] You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. Leave aReply [...]

  14. XiAP GUI Studio » Blog Archive » WordPress Widgets: Plugin available Says:

    [...] Well done Andy and co. [...]

  15. Grag Says:

    Hmm… Where I can find widgets catalog ?

  16. VentureFiles » Blog Archive » Finally, there is order in the Wordpress Universe Says:

    [...] there is a cool new tool called WordPress.com Sidebar Widgets. They are from WordPress developer, Andy Skelton and they are a cool method of accessorizing your WordPress.com sidebar on WordPress Themes which [...]

  17. 463f9ef32b Says:

    463f9ef32b

    463f9ef32b

Comments are closed.