Old plugins contribution

Need to contact plugin author directly and ask a permission for contributing?

Yes. Have you tried downloading the plugins and checking the readme.txt file?

Hi Esmi,

Thank you very much for your answer.
Yes of course. I’m just asking to clarify this questions for other authors as well.

Even if there is any contact information in the readme.txt file, the author can not response on such request. What should I do in such situation?

Need to contact plugin author directly and ask a permission for contributing? But if there are no contact information, or this information is outdated, or the author doesn’t respond?

If you cannot contact the author then there is always the option to fork the plugin and give it a new name. Search the plugin repo for “reloaded” to find some examples.

I’m not on the plugin team but as long as your new plugin isn’t just a duplicate and contains fixes or updates then I’m sure that would be fine.

I’d also suggest crediting the original plugin author in something like the readme.txt of the new “reloaded” plugin.

I forgot that part. Credit is important and needs to be maintained. ??

Thanks a lot for such detailed explanation. Of course, credits are important for sure.

I have one more question.

For example, plugin which is outdated still has active users, and they like it as it is. And they don’t know that the new version of the same plugin is reloaded. In such way, maybe it would be better to add additional contributor to the plugin? I think this much easier in terms of updates for active users who already running plugin installation on their system. They will receive notifications and ability to update plugin in few clicks. What do you think?

Is it possible to submit such request on WordPress (here for example)? When author do not respond and I would like to become a contributor to support his/her plugin in future. Who can review such requests?

Thanks!

They will receive notifications and ability to update plugin in few clicks. What do you think?

In my opinion I think that is a horrible idea. I myself would be completely against users being notified like that.

If the original plugin author can be contacted and wants to make you a plugin contributor or full on plugin author then great. Problem solved. ??

If you do not get a reply or the author isn’t available or willing then I do not think it is advantageous to users to somehow be sent to update to your updated plugin*.

User’s obtain plugins based on their needs and searching via the forums and the plugin page. If an old one works for them then that’s great and their need is fulfilled. Your “reloaded” plugin (really must think of a less year 2000 label…) will show up in that search as well.

*Note: some plugin authors and users have taken to going to the support forum for the older plugin and promoting the newer competing one. If you do offer a reloaded version (newer? updated? spiffy? need a new label…) then let users discover the new one themselves without doing that.

This means that they no longer supported by their authors and may have compatibility issues when used with more recent versions of WordPress.

No, this means they haven’t been updated. They MAY no longer be supported. They MAY have problems. A surprisingly large number are just fine. Go figure.

1) Try to find the author. Post in the support forums, read the source code to see if there’s an email/webaddress to ping them via.

2) Email plugins AT www.ads-software.com and explain what you’ve done by way of contacting them, what plugin this is (PLEASE link to the plugin, I swear to peanut butter, if I get another ‘I want to take over a Twitter plugin’ I might just start deleting your posts out of spite… not really (really)), and a link to your NEW code.

We may give it to you, we may not. Depends on the plugin and … you ??

Mika, thank you for clarification! I understand the process now.