.. title: Extending Nikola .. slug: extending .. date: 2012-03-30 23:00:00 UTC-03:00 .. tags: .. link: .. description: .. author: The Nikola Team Extending Nikola ================ :Version: 7.8.4 :Author: Roberto Alsina .. class:: alert alert-info pull-right .. contents:: .. class:: lead Nikola is extensible. Almost all its functionality is based on plugins, and you can add your own or replace the provided ones. Plugins consist of a metadata file (with ``.plugin`` extension) and a Python module (a ``.py`` file) or package (a folder containing a ``__init__.py`` file. To use a plugin in your site, you just have to put it in a ``plugins`` folder in your site. Plugins come in various flavours, aimed at extending different aspects of Nikola. Command Plugins --------------- When you run ``nikola --help`` you will see something like this: .. code-block:: console $ nikola help Nikola is a tool to create static websites and blogs. For full documentation and more information, please visit https://getnikola.com/ Available commands: nikola auto automatically detect site changes, rebuild and optionally refresh a browser nikola bootswatch_theme given a swatch name from bootswatch.com and a parent theme, creates a custom theme nikola build run tasks nikola check check links and files in the generated site nikola clean clean action / remove targets nikola console start an interactive python console with access to your site and configuration nikola deploy deploy the site nikola dumpdb dump dependency DB nikola forget clear successful run status from internal DB nikola help show help nikola ignore ignore task (skip) on subsequent runs nikola import_blogger import a blogger dump nikola import_feed import a RSS/Atom dump nikola import_wordpress import a WordPress dump nikola init create a Nikola site in the specified folder nikola list list tasks from dodo file nikola mincss apply mincss to the generated site nikola new_post create a new blog post or site page nikola run run tasks nikola serve start the test webserver nikola strace use strace to list file_deps and targets nikola theme manage themes nikola version print the Nikola version number nikola help show help / reference nikola help show command usage nikola help show task usage That will give you a list of all available commands in your version of Nikola. Each and every one of those is a plugin. Let's look at a typical example: First, the ``serve.plugin`` file: .. code-block:: ini [Core] Name = serve Module = serve [Documentation] Author = Roberto Alsina Version = 0.1 Website = https://getnikola.com Description = Start test server. .. note:: If you want to publish your plugin on the Plugin Index, `read the docs for the Index `__ (and the .plugin file examples and explanations). For your own plugin, just change the values in a sensible way. The ``Module`` will be used to find the matching Python module, in this case ``serve.py``, from which this is the interesting bit: .. code-block:: python from nikola.plugin_categories import Command # You have to inherit Command for this to be a # command plugin: class CommandServe(Command): """Start test server.""" name = "serve" doc_usage = "[options]" doc_purpose = "start the test webserver" cmd_options = ( { 'name': 'port', 'short': 'p', 'long': 'port', 'default': 8000, 'type': int, 'help': 'Port number (default: 8000)', }, { 'name': 'address', 'short': 'a', 'long': '--address', 'type': str, 'default': '127.0.0.1', 'help': 'Address to bind (default: 127.0.0.1)', }, ) def _execute(self, options, args): """Start test server.""" out_dir = self.site.config['OUTPUT_FOLDER'] if not os.path.isdir(out_dir): print("Error: Missing '{0}' folder?".format(out_dir)) else: os.chdir(out_dir) httpd = HTTPServer((options['address'], options['port']), OurHTTPRequestHandler) sa = httpd.socket.getsockname() print("Serving HTTP on", sa[0], "port", sa[1], "...") httpd.serve_forever() As mentioned above, a plugin can have options, which the user can see by doing ``nikola help command`` and can later use, for example: .. code-block:: console $ nikola help serve Purpose: start the test webserver Usage: nikola serve [options] Options: -p ARG, --port=ARG Port number (default: 8000) -a ARG, ----address=ARG Address to bind (default: 127.0.0.1) $ nikola serve -p 9000 Serving HTTP on 127.0.0.1 port 9000 ... So, what can you do with commands? Well, anything you want, really. I have implemented a sort of planet using it. So, be creative, and if you do something interesting, let me know ;-) TemplateSystem Plugins ---------------------- Nikola supports Mako and Jinja2. If you prefer some other templating system, then you will have to write a ``TemplateSystem`` plugin. Here's how they work. First, you have to create a ``.plugin`` file. Here's the one for the Mako plugin: .. code-block:: ini [Core] Name = mako Module = mako [Documentation] Author = Roberto Alsina Version = 0.1 Website = https://getnikola.com Description = Support for Mako templates. .. note:: If you want to publish your plugin on the Plugin Index, `read the docs for the Index `__ (and the .plugin file examples and explanations). You will have to replace "mako" with your template system's name, and other data in the obvious ways. The "Module" option is the name of the module, which has to look something like this, a stub for a hypothetical system called "Templater": .. code-block:: python from nikola.plugin_categories import TemplateSystem # You have to inherit TemplateSystem class TemplaterTemplates(TemplateSystem): """Wrapper for Templater templates.""" # name has to match Name in the .plugin file name = "templater" # A list of directories where the templates will be # located. Most template systems have some sort of # template loading tool that can use this. def set_directories(self, directories, cache_folder): """Sets the list of folders where templates are located and cache.""" pass # You *must* implement this, even if to return [] # It should return a list of all the files that, # when changed, may affect the template's output. # usually this involves template inheritance and # inclusion. def template_deps(self, template_name): """Returns filenames which are dependencies for a template.""" return [] def render_template(self, template_name, output_name, context): """Renders template to a file using context. This must save the data to output_name *and* return it so that the caller may do additional processing. """ pass # The method that does the actual rendering. # template_name is the name of the template file, # context is a dictionary containing the data the template # uses for rendering. def render_template_to_string(self, template, context): """Renders template to a string using context. """ pass def inject_directory(self, directory): """Injects the directory with the lowest priority in the template search mechanism.""" pass You can see a real example in `the Jinja plugin `__ Task Plugins ------------ If you want to do something that depends on the data in your site, you probably want to do a ``Task`` plugin, which will make it be part of the ``nikola build`` command. These are the currently available tasks, all provided by plugins: .. sidebar:: Other Tasks There are also ``LateTask`` plugins, which are executed later, and ``TaskMultiplier`` plugins that take a task and create more tasks out of it. .. code-block:: console $ nikola list Scanning posts....done! build_bundles build_less copy_assets copy_files post_render redirect render_archive render_galleries render_galleries_clean render_indexes render_listings render_pages render_posts render_rss render_site render_sources render_tags sitemap These have access to the ``site`` object which contains your timeline and your configuration. The critical bit of Task plugins is their ``gen_tasks`` method, which ``yields`` `doit tasks `_. The details of how to handle dependencies, etc., are a bit too much for this document, so I'll just leave you with an example, the ``copy_assets`` task. First the ``task_copy_assets.plugin`` file, which you should copy and edit in the logical ways: .. code-block:: ini [Core] Name = copy_assets Module = task_copy_assets [Documentation] Author = Roberto Alsina Version = 0.1 Website = https://getnikola.com Description = Copy theme assets into output. .. note:: If you want to publish your plugin on the Plugin Index, `read the docs for the Index `_ (and the .plugin file examples and explanations). And the ``task_copy_assets.py`` file, in its entirety: .. code-block:: python import os from nikola.plugin_categories import Task from nikola import utils # Have to inherit Task to be a task plugin class CopyAssets(Task): """Copy theme assets into output.""" name = "copy_assets" # This yields the tasks def gen_tasks(self): """Create tasks to copy the assets of the whole theme chain. If a file is present on two themes, use the version from the "youngest" theme. """ # I put all the configurations and data the plugin uses # in a dictionary because utils.config_changed will # make it so that if these change, this task will be # marked out of date, and run again. kw = { "themes": self.site.THEMES, "output_folder": self.site.config['OUTPUT_FOLDER'], "filters": self.site.config['FILTERS'], } tasks = {} for theme_name in kw['themes']: src = os.path.join(utils.get_theme_path(theme_name), 'assets') dst = os.path.join(kw['output_folder'], 'assets') for task in utils.copy_tree(src, dst): if task['name'] in tasks: continue tasks[task['name']] = task task['uptodate'] = task.get('uptodate', []) + \ [utils.config_changed(kw)] task['basename'] = self.name # If your task generates files, please do this. yield utils.apply_filters(task, kw['filters']) PageCompiler Plugins -------------------- These plugins implement markup languages, they take sources for posts or pages and create HTML or other output files. A good example is `the misaka plugin `__ or the built-in compiler plugins. They must provide: ``compile`` Function that builds a file. ``create_post`` Function that creates an empty file with some metadata in it. If the compiler produces something other than HTML files, it should also implement ``extension`` which returns the preferred extension for the output file. These plugins can also be used to extract metadata from a file. To do so, the plugin may implement ``read_metadata`` that will return a dict containing the metadata contained in the file. RestExtension Plugins --------------------- Implement directives for reStructuredText, see `media.py `__ for a simple example. If your output depends on a config value, you need to make your post record a dependency on a pseudo-path, like this: .. code-block:: text ####MAGIC####CONFIG:OPTIONNAME Then, whenever the ``OPTIONNAME`` option is changed in conf.py, the file will be rebuilt. If your directive depends or may depend on the whole timeline (like the ``post-list`` directive, where adding new posts to the site could make it stale), you should record a dependency on the pseudo-path ``####MAGIC####TIMELINE``. MarkdownExtension Plugins ------------------------- Implement Markdown extensions, see `mdx_nikola.py `__ for a simple example. Note that Python markdown extensions are often also available as separate packages. This is only meant to ship extensions along with Nikola. SignalHandler Plugins --------------------- These plugins extend the ``SignalHandler`` class and connect to one or more signals via `blinker `_. The easiest way to do this is to reimplement ``set_site()`` and just connect to whatever signals you want there. Currently Nikola emits the following signals: ``sighandlers_loaded`` Right after SignalHandler plugin activation. ``initialized`` When all tasks are loaded. ``configured`` When all the configuration file is processed. Note that plugins are activated before this is emitted. ``scanned`` After posts are scanned. ``new_post`` / ``new_page`` When a new post is created, using the ``nikola new_post``/``nikola new_page`` commands. The signal data contains the path of the file, and the metadata file (if there is one). ``existing_post`` / ``existing_page`` When a new post fails to be created due to a title conflict. Contains the same data as ``new_post``. ``deployed`` When the ``nikola deploy`` command is run, and there is at least one new entry/post since ``last_deploy``. The signal data is of the form:: { 'last_deploy: # datetime object for the last deployed time, 'new_deploy': # datetime object for the current deployed time, 'clean': # whether there was a record of a last deployment, 'deployed': # all files deployed after the last deploy, 'undeployed': # all files not deployed since they are either future posts/drafts } ``compiled`` When a post/page is compiled from its source to html, before anything else is done with it. The signal data is in the form:: { 'source': # the path to the source file 'dest': # the path to the cache file for the post/page 'post': # the Post object for the post/page } One example is the `deploy_hooks plugin. `__ ConfigPlugin Plugins -------------------- Does nothing specific, can be used to modify the site object (and thus the config). Put all the magic you want in ``set_site()``, and don’t forget to run the one from ``super()``. Example plugin: `navstories `__ PostScanner Plugins ------------------- Get posts and pages from "somewhere" to be added to the timeline. The only currently existing plugin of this kind reads them from disk. Plugin Index ============ There is a `plugin index `__, which stores all of the plugins for Nikola people wanted to share with the world. You may want to read the `README for the Index `_ if you want to publish your package there. Path/Link Resolution Mechanism ============================== Any plugin can register a function using ``Nikola.register_path_handler`` to allow resolution of paths and links. These are useful for templates, which can access them via ``_link``. For example, you can always get a link to the path for the feed of the "foo" tag by using ``_link('tag_rss', 'foo')`` or the ``link://tag_rss/foo`` URL. Here's the relevant code from the tag plugin. .. code-block:: python # In set_site site.register_path_handler('tag_rss', self.tag_rss_path) # And these always take name and lang as arguments and returl a list of # path elements. def tag_rss_path(self, name, lang): return [_f for _f in [self.site.config['TRANSLATIONS'][lang], self.site.config['TAG_PATH'], self.slugify_name(name, lang) + ".xml"] if _f] Template Hooks ============== Plugins can use a hook system for adding stuff into templates. In order to use it, a plugin must register itself. The following hooks currently exist: * ``extra_head`` (not equal to the config option!) * ``body_end`` (not equal to the config option!) * ``page_header`` * ``menu`` * ``menu_alt`` (right-side menu in bootstrap, after ``menu`` in base) * ``page_footer`` For example, in order to register a script into ``extra_head``: .. code-block:: python # In set_site site.template_hooks['extra_head'].append('