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chatSummaries/docs/how-plugins-work.md
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lyuksovannyyandClaude Opus 5.5 b885f2179f
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[no bump] Move technical docs to docs/, add icon and PNG export tool
README now carries the icon, TL;DR, description and features; the
technical sections live in docs/. tools/icon_png.py renders
images/icon.svg to a square PNG (512x512 by default, --resolution N).
plugin.json points at the plugin's own icon.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-10-09 14:16:37 +02:00

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How exteraGram plugins work

How exteraGram plugins actually work

A plugin, as exteraGram loads it, is exactly one Python file on the device: /data/user/0/com.exteragram.messenger/files/plugins/<plugin_id>.py. The distribution convention names the same content <id>.plugin.

The app reads plugin metadata statically via AST — it looks for top-level constant assignments (__id__, __name__, __description__, __author__, __version__, __icon__, __app_version__, __sdk_version__, __requirements__) without executing the file. Only __id__ and __name__ are required.

The file must define exactly one class inheriting BasePlugin (from base_plugin import BasePlugin). Lifecycle methods (on_plugin_load, on_plugin_unload, create_settings) and hooks (on_send_message_hook, pre_request_hook, post_request_hook, on_update_hook(s), on_app_event) are all called by the host; hooks must be registered inside on_plugin_load (e.g. self.add_on_send_message_hook()). A hook returns a HookResult(strategy=HookStrategy.MODIFY, params=params) to apply changes, or a bare HookResult() to pass through. Settings rows returned from create_settings come from ui.settings (Header, Input, Switch, Text, Selector, Divider) and persist through self.get_setting/self.set_setting. Logging goes through android_utils.log; Chaquopy also redirects sys.stdout/sys.stderr to the logcat tags python.stdout/python.stderr.

This repo does not use the official Elyx/ElyxBuilder archive format — see sdk-notes.md for why.