Distributing a QGIS plugin means placing the collection of files on a server as a ZIP
file, with a special configuration file, in order to allow the QGIS plugin manager to locate and install the plugin. The QGIS project has an official repository, but third-party repositories are also permitted. The official repository is very strict regarding how the plugin is uploaded. So, for this recipe, we'll set up a simple third-party repository for a sample plugin and test it with the QGIS plugin manager to avoid polluting the main QGIS repository with a test project.
In order to complete this recipe, you'll need a sample plugin and a web-accessible directory. You'll also need a zip
tool such as the free 7-zip program (http://www.7-zip.org/download.html). You can use the MyPlugin example from the Creating a QGIS plugin recipe as the plugin to distribute. For a web directory, you can use a Google Code repository, GitHub repository, or an other online directory you can access. Code repositories work well because they are a good place to store a plugin that you are developing.
In the following steps, we will package our plugin, create a server configuration file for it, and place it on a server to create a QGIS plugin repository:
.ZIP
file..ZIP
file to contain the plugin's version number:Myplugin.0.1.0.zip
icon.png
file from your plugin directory to the web directory.plugins.xml
metadata file for your plugin. Most of the data you need can be found in the metatdata.txt
file in your plugin directory. The following example provides some guidance:<?xml version = '1.0' encoding = 'UTF-8'?> <?xml-stylesheet type="text/xsl" href="" ?> <plugins> <pyqgis_plugin name="My Plugin" version="0.1.0" plugin_id="227"> <description> <![CDATA[Demonstration of a QGIS Plugin]]> </description> <about></about> <version>0.1.0</version> <qgis_minimum_version>1.8.0</qgis_minimum_version> <qgis_maximum_version>2.9.9</qgis_maximum_version> <homepage> <![CDATA[https://code.google.com/p/geospatialpython]]> </homepage> <file_name>MyPlugin.0.1.0.zip</file_name> <icon> http://geospatialpython.googlecode.com/svn/icon_227.png </icon> <author_name><![CDATA[Joel Lawhead]]></author_name> <download_url> http://geospatialpython.googlecode.com/svn/MyPlugin.0.1.0.zip </download_url> <uploaded_by><![CDATA[jll]]></uploaded_by> <create_date>2014-05-16T15:31:19.824333</create_date> <update_date>2014-07-15T15:31:19.824333</update_date> <experimental>True</experimental> <deprecated>False</deprecated> <tracker> <![CDATA[http://code.google.com/p/geospatialpython/issues]]> </tracker> <repository> <![CDATA[https://geospatialpython.googlecode.com/svn/]]> </repository> <tags> <![CDATA[development,debugging,tools]]></tags> <downloads>0</downloads> <average_vote>0</average_vote> <rating_votes>0</rating_votes> </pyqgis_plugin> </plugins>
plugins.xml
file to your web directory.plugins.xml
in the URL field.