[wp-hackers] Code reviews for plugins?

[Paul]

After reading all this new discussion I think I would like to reconsider my previous +1 submission. 

When I read the original comments on this thread last week I though the purpose was to put together a peer review process where plugin developer can offer advice to other plugin developers as review of their code. I originally took this advice as something along the lines of "Well, your code works but this set of routines you've written would be better served if you just hooked into this WP filter and tried this technique (see xxx plugin as an example)". The goal I thought was to share WP plugin development knowledge and make any mediocre plugin developer a better developer. Like myself.   

In reading this last set of messages it almost sounds like you guys want to put together a self-appointed committee where you rate plugins based on some yet to be determined checklist. Why not just publish the check list somewhere some plugin developers can check their own plugin? I agree 100% with someone who wrote about people counting against you for not using the proper camel-case or not putting your JS into a sub-folder. This is crap. No one who uses your plugin will case. What should be review is the code written and its intended functionality. 

Many times I receive requests or remarks from user of my plugins They suggest adding features or functionality I have no intention or adding because in my opinion this was not part of the intended use of the plugin. 

Paul





On Aug 23, 2010, at 4:46 AM, Harry Metcalfe wrote:

> On 23/08/10 04:49, Mark E wrote:
> > I'm seeing a big issue centered around delivering a false sense of
> > security to numerous millions of innocent people.
> 
> I agree. I like the idea about having objective criteria, and if the results of reviews were phrased appropriately -- ie, accurately -- that would be a nice thing to have.
> 
> But just to say "The community has reviewed this plugin and it looks A-OK to us" is a really bad idea. For a start, I'm not sure you can really do that in a generic way: to make that statement for any particular user, you'd need to know what other plugins they were running, and what their theme does. But ordinary, non-tecchie WP users will just interpret it as a badge of quality and may therefore be misled.
> 
> But more importantly, just to say a plugin has been "reviewed" without knowing what the reviewer was looking for is meaningless. They could have been looking for fluffy bunnies. It essentially ends up being a review to look for the things the reviewer thinks are important. Which is perhaps slightly better than nothing, but not much.
> 
> I think we should come up with a list of the top 25 mistakes people make in plugins, review to find those, perhaps also highlight whatever else looks problematic and tell the author, and then say to users "This plugin has passed a review which checks for some common WordPress plugin problems" or somesuch...
> 
> Harry
> 
> PS: if this plan means I never have to spend hours fixing all the notices in someone else's plugin, that would be nice.
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