One of the biggest strengths of WP is its extensibilitiy–plugins add custom functionality that give you, in practice, a lightweight content management system on the cafeteria plan. You use exactly what you need.
For common needs, there may be huge selection of plugins to acheive the same ends. But for less common needs, it may be that you only find a single plugin that will do your bidding; what if the plugin of your dreams (or at least of your needs) is out there…but was written for Wordpress three versions ago? Restart from scratch?
I’m happy to say, “No!” About five mintues of detective work will tell you everything you need to know in order to use an old plugin on your current WP install.
I’m not saying don’t look at the update history, by any means. Especially for mission critical site functions where you may have a dozen choices, choosing the plugin with ongoing updates is going to make your life easier. You’ll get new functions over time, and a plugin author who supports his or her creation is to be much valued (and tipped as well). But if the plugin you want isn’t for your current version of Wordpress, it’s still may work out perfectly for you.
Step 1 – The first thing to do is to visit the plugin’s page in the Wordpress plugin directory. This is linked from the plugin search area of your WP 2.7+ installation, so it’s easy to find for any plugin you’re considering.
We’re looking for the “See what others are saying…” link. If the plugin has been downloaded more than three times and breaks in the newer versions of WP, you can bet your Akismet that somebody will be hollering about it here! Bonus points: Sometimes plugin author responses here give you some idea of their approach to coding the plugin and give you insight into potential problems with using the plugin.
Step 2 – Check the plugin home page. Many times, plugin authors redirect support requests to the plugin homepage, or people will just ask questions or toss out their complaints in the comments section of plugin announcements. This is also a good place to check for simple fixes–may be that the plugin will work fine with newer versions of WP with minor adjustments to the code. While hacking the plugin is usually not an ideal solution, it’s probably better than creating a custom solution and updates won’t be much of an issue for a plugin that’s been abandoned.
Step 3 – Try it out! I’ll give the standard advice here (that I know you are ignoring): back up your installation first. I’ve never toasted a Wordpress install with a bad plugin, but I won’t promise it cannot happen. Being prepared is smart. If you’re working with an unknown especially–ehem…an unknown that has the power to change your WP database, that is–then be especially smart. I keep a personal blog to test iffy plugins, but a backup of your live site should be sufficient if you don’t want to keep a test install setup.
That’s it! This approach works for me approximately 90% of the time I want a specific pluin that isn’t available for the WP version I’m running. If you think about it, it makes sense: unless the plugin access parts of the code that have been changed since the version it was built for, it can work just as well for you as for someone running the correct version of WP for the plugin.
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Posted on May 4, 2009 at 12:50 pm in: Web Advice
