[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #64098: Introduce Abilities API

[WordPress Trac]

#64098: Introduce Abilities API
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 Reporter:  gziolo                                |       Owner:  (none)
     Type:  feature request                       |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal                                |   Milestone:  6.9
Component:  General                               |     Version:  trunk
 Severity:  normal                                |  Resolution:
 Keywords:  has-patch 2nd-opinion has-unit-tests  |     Focuses:
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Comment (by jason_the_adams):

 Replying to [comment:28 jorbin]:
 > Can you go a bit deeper on what you mean by "self-authenticating"? I'm
 not finding anything in [https://github.com/search?q=repo%3AWordPress
 %2Fabilities-api%20%22self-authenticating%22&type=code the github repo] or
 in slack that describes the API in such a way.

 I think he means self-authorizing. That is, the Ability can do a
 permissions check prior to executing.


 **First-class Integrations API**

 Something that's been on my mind as I've helped build this comes from my
 experience building plugins like GiveWP, The Events Calendar, and so
 forth. Every plugin has 3rd party integration on its mind when building
 things out. Things like hooks and the REST API are often utilized to
 provide integration APIs, but there's also just PHP and JS
 functions/classes and the like meant to be used for integration. At this
 point, there is no first-class way to do this in WordPress; each plugin is
 left to determine how it wants to structure its APIs for discoverability
 and use.

 The Ability API is, at its core, a formal public functions API for use in
 integrations. At this time, we're thinking of contexts such as REST, MCP,
 Command Palette, CLI, and so forth. But that's really because the
 Abilities API is already serving its purpose!

 This is to say, that I think the Abilities API presents immediate value to
 the ecosystem, and folks will explore even further contexts for its use.
 If I was still working on GiveWP, I'd immediately provide a bunch of
 Abilities for interacting with campaigns, forms, and donations as a first-
 class way for 3rd parties to discover and use. The fact that these
 Abilities, with minimal configuration effort, can also be used in REST,
 MCP, and such is a cherry on top!

 The more scenarios I've run through my head with the Abilties API as it
 is, the more I like it. I'm sure it will be (and should be) battle tested,
 at which point we'll iterate on it. I'm 100% with you, @jorbin, that I'd
 like to get this adopted as quickly as possible, and will personally put
 effort into making that happens during the beta. 👍

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Ticket URL: <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/64098#comment:33>
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