Support for Plugins Admin & NppPluginList - Round 2

donho

All the support request, bug report & feature request for Plugins Admin & NppPluginList go here.

dinkumoil

There is a known bug in the unzipping code for plugin ZIP packages. If a plugin comes with companion files, plugin installer GUP.exe may produce 0-byte files when unzipping them. Affected plugins may fail to work.

See here, here and here.

DataCrypt

I always use the NPP portable (zipped) version. When I download the latest 7.6.1 zip x86 32-bit file and extract it (over my older version 7.5.9), I don’t have the new Plugins Admin. How do I get that installed using the non-install version of NPP? Worse is that I now don’t even have the older Plugins Manager and many of my add-ons are missing. Any help would be appreciated. Thank you.

rddim

@DataCrypt I have the same problem.This is because there are no nppPluginList.dll in the plugins\Config folder and the GUP.exe, gup.xml and libcurl.dll in the updater folder. I grab it from the installer version opened with 7zip.

dinkumoil

@DataCrypt

The reason why you don’t see Plugin Admin is that portable versions of Notepad++ currently are not shipped with the required files mentioned by @rddim , BUT there is a good reason for that. I will explain it below.

At first I want to point you to this posting. There you can gain some knowledge about the new plugin directory structure required by Notepad++ (for portable installations read point 2.).

Read this posting to learn what to do to get your already installed plugins back to a working state. Please note: It is not required to reinstall them all, they only have to be moved to the right location.

Now, what’s the reason for the lack of Plugin Admin respectively the files GUP.exe, gup.xml and libcurl.dll? GUP.exe initially was designed (and used for years) as the updater for Notepad++ itself (not the plugins!). After introduction of Plugin Admin @donho decided to extend its functionality and to use it for updating plugins, too.

The problem with this design is, that if you click on (menu) ? -> Update Notepad++ in a portable installation, GUP.exe will download the installer version of Notepad++. Imagine you did this in a portable version running from an USB stick, you will end up with a local installation of Notepad++ on the system where you plugged the stick. That is mostly not what users expect and/or want. Thus GUP.exe and its companion files are not included in portable versions of Notepad++.

DataCrypt

@rddim - Thank you! I extracted these files and now have the Plugin Admin which has allowed me to go grab my addons!

@dinkumoil - Thank you for the detailed explanation. Makes sense as to why the updater is not included in the portable version and how the updater is also now used for the Plugins. However, I would not update NPP this way - but rather download the ZIP file again to update. I only want the benefits of the updater to use it for plugins. Would be nice if NPP would know how it’s installed portable and include these files to work appropriately. Maybe something DonHo might look to include in a future update?

Thanks again!

Scott Sumner

@DataCrypt said:

I only want the benefits of the updater to use it for plugins

Am I the only one in the world that doesn’t constantly update stuff? I mean, I only go looking for updates if something is not working right…if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it…otherwise you really may break it… How many people using Notepad++ had sh*tfits because they thought, “Sure, I’ll update Notepad++ to v.7.6…why the hell not?” and then spent the rest of the day scratching their heads (or worse, asking their I.T. departments) about where their plugins went?

donho

@Scott-Sumner said:

Am I the only one in the world that doesn’t constantly update stuff? I mean, I only go looking for updates if something is not working right…if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it…otherwise you really may break it… How many people using Notepad++ had sh*tfits because they thought, “Sure, I’ll update Notepad++ to v.7.6…why the hell not?” and then spent the rest of the day scratching their heads (or worse, asking their I.T. departments) about where their plugins went?

I have apologized to all users for the inconvenient on the news:
https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/notepad-7.6.1-released.html

I guess no need to do it again here.

We will try to help users to get through all problems, that’s why this thread exists. You’re happy or not about new Plugins Admin, it will stay, because it’s important for the community. We need people in the community to help us, but we don’t need people’s whining - it makes the thread too long to read.

I have created a new category boycott Notepad++ so please use it if you wanna say any shit about Notepad++. Otherwise any complain without description of problem or constructive suggestion out of boycott Notepad++ will be removed.

Meta Chuh

@donho

forgive scott, we all just had a few rough days here lately trying to help other users.

i like the recent changes and everything you did worked for me so far.
there’s a lot of potential in it and we’ll try to support all newer users the best we can through all the changes because we see a reason in 99% of it

… and yes, the missing 1% will go to boycott Notepad++ here ;-) 😂👍

MrOuzo

now all Plugins going to %PROGRAMDATA%\Notepad++\plugins\ with a directory same name as the DLL…hmmm…for one DLL file?
I think the best thing is, the config for this plugin is also at this place. All what you need for a plugin in one directory. You can copy this directory with all config and files you need to another PC, or you can delete this directory and all files for this plugins are gone.

pnedev

@MrOuzo said:

I think the best thing is, the config for this plugin is also at this place.

It is not a good thing to do because you have one plugin dll for all users but every user has his/hers own unique config.

dinkumoil

@pnedev said:

It is not a good thing to do because you have one plugin dll for all users but every user has his/hers own unique config.

You are right. Additionally we would need a new method for plugins to query the path to their config files because Notepad++ can only answer the query if it knows which plugin has queried.

@MrOuzo Please note: There are also portable installations of Notepad++ where the path to the config files is different from that one of local installations.

The requirement to introduce a new query method for the config file path would break all existing plugins. Users would have to wait for an update of their plugins, which might never happen.

squeeze69

Hi.

Sigh, I’ve just updated to 7.6.1, 32bit version, no luck, Plugin Admin is still missing.
The old plugin manager “just worked”, but this one :(

Upgraded from 7.5.9 to 7.6.0, then to 7.6.1, moved the plugins as suggested (one directory = one plugin with the name of the main dll).

Still:

while installing, I cannot flag “autoupdate” (but the exec is there, GUP.EXE)…
After installation, there is no “plugin admin” anywhere. :(

BTW: apart from this annoying thing, Notepad++ is good as always.

Meta Chuh

@squeeze69

usually this should solve this problem:

make a backup of your plugins folder(s) if you need them

uninstall notepad++ completely
delete all Notepad++ folders you can find in:
%PROGRAMFILES(X86)%,
%LOCALAPPDATA%,
%APPDATA% and
%PROGRAMDATA%

reinstall with this 7.6.1 (x86) installer and make sure “Auto-Updater” and “Plugins Admin” are selected
(note: auto updater will be selected but greyed out as soon as plugins admin is checked because auto updater is mandatory for plugins admin)

donho

@dinkumoil said:

There is a known bug in the unzipping code for plugin ZIP packages. If a plugin comes with companion files, plugin installer GUP.exe may produce 0-byte files when unzipping them. Affected plugins may fail to work.

This issue is fixed and merged into master of wingup for Notepad++:
https://github.com/notepad-plus-plus/wingup/commit/a4f12fd8cd0ca6eb6e44594b08ef6c9e2665a72e
The bug will be fixed in the next release.

dinkumoil

@donho said:

The bug will be fixed in the next release.

Thank you again!

shawnkhall

Feature request: column sorting within Plugins Admin. Since there’s no logical default sort order and the search is limited, sorting will help us find our favorite plugins.

DataCrypt

@donho Thank you for all your work on NPP. I like the new PlugIn Admin and if you can somehow include that in the portable version so that it’s available in a future release, that would be very helpful. Thank you again and happy holidays!

This post is deleted!

ivanbuto

Question: Is it possible to make the new Plugins Admin work also on Windows XP or would this be too much work?
I tried Notepad++ to 7.6.1 with the Plugins Admin. The lists of plugins read fine, however, the update process didn’t work due to a missing function. I can provide a screenshot if needed.
Plugin Manager worked fine also with Windows XP.