Add Create a backend add-on section in the Developer guide with GenericSetup

[stevepiercy]

• Enhance the Development Guide index
• Update the term Buildout in the Glossary to point to dusty old, yet useful, docs in Plone 4.
• Source for GenericSetup already converted to MyST: https://github.com/plone/documentation/blob/5.2-myst/5.2-myst/develop/addons/components/genericsetup.md
• List of possible sources from Backend > Configuration Registry needs content (GenericSetup) #1424

See #1748 (comment)

Closes #1754.

Ping @petschki to take it from here.

---

📚 Documentation preview 📚: https://plone6--1757.org.readthedocs.build/

[stevepiercy]

I'm ready to close this issue as won't fix. Does anyone on @plone/classicui-team care about the topic of how to add or create a backend add-on section in the Developer guide with GenericSetup? If so, speak up, and let's get this finished.

[petschki]

@stevepiercy will have a look at this.

[petschki]

I've created a basic "addon creation documentation" and moved the old docs for GenericSetup here. I've also removed several outdated parts/link and tried to update the XML examples. Not finished yet though.

I would recommend to place these docs all inside "Backend" and make a link from "Developer guide / Develop backend add-ons" -> "Backend / Add-ons" (like its done for Volto add-ons)

Further we can add references for several plonecli installation guides (like Classic-UI / theming / create theme addon) to the new "Backend / Add-on" doc ...

What do you think?

[petschki]

what's also missing is something like "Installing backend Add-on" ... at least I didn't find it... would also make sense to add it to "Backend / Add-ons" chapter.

EDIT: I mean adding a pypi package or source checkout to cookieplone/buildout project ...

[stevepiercy]

what's also missing is something like "Installing backend Add-on" ... at least I didn't find it... would also make sense to add it to "Backend / Add-ons" chapter.

EDIT: I mean adding a pypi package or source checkout to cookieplone/buildout project ...

Was this what you couldn't find?

https://6.docs.plone.org/admin-guide/add-ons.html

The plan is to merge the Admin section into Develop section so that people don't have to think of what role they're in versus the task they want to perform. See #1997.

[petschki]

Ah ... exactly.

Merging this to development section makes completely sense to me. Maybe we can do it like Volto does, to have an Developer Guide -> Add-ons directory, with `create/add/test" sub chapters.

Sidenote: what confuses me is, that when I click "Developer Guide -> Develop Volto Add-ons" I get redirected directly to the Volto Development 2nd level subdirectory ... from a UI perspective I would never redirect directly when clicking in the navigation area, instead have at least a small introductionary text in the content area with the link to the desired target.

[stevepiercy]

Sidenote: what confuses me is, that when I click "Developer Guide -> Develop Volto Add-ons" I get redirected directly to the Volto Development 2nd level subdirectory ... from a UI perspective I would never redirect directly when clicking in the navigation area, instead have at least a small introductionary text in the content area with the link to the desired target.

In a perfect world, we'd have one repo for all documentation in an easy-to-organize hierarchy. However, we use submodules to pull in documentation from multiple repos, and therefore can't easily have a single hierarchical structure. plone.restapi and plone.api have similar things.

We made the decision to use redirects as a compromise. There are placeholder files there that perform the actual redirect when the meta refresh tag fails in a browser for security reasons, but people were annoyed that they had to click twice to get to the content. Eventually, when the re-organization dust settles, we'll look into symlinks.

[stevepiercy]

@petschki it's a holiday weekend here in the US. I'll review this next week.

Did you copy and paste this from the sources listed in the description, or did you modify any of it? It needs some serious editorial work.

[petschki]

I've copied the merged GenericSetup document and removed the outdated parts ... I'll finish that this week. Happy Thanksgiving ...

[erral]

I would remove using plonecli to create the addon. The latests alpha release calls uvx cookieplone under the hood, so it does the same.

We keep the addon template in there because all the testing is based on creating the addon

[erral]

You can also use make add <subtemplate> inside the backend folder of the structure created by cookieplone

[petschki]

the Makefile only exists in the monorepo backend folder, am I correct?

If you simply create a uvx cookieplone backend_addon there is no Makefile (at least for me) ... I'll outline both scenarios.

[erral]

I have just made a test, I see the correct Makefile and it contains the make add command support.

[petschki]

Oh, sorry... you're right. I've looked in my plonecli created addon, not in the cookieplone backend_addon version 🫣

I'll update this ...

[erral]

Suggested change

	The generated addon contains a {file}`bobtemplates.cfg` file which lets you add several subtemplates with `plonecli`.
	The generated addon contains a {file}`bobtemplate.cfg` file which lets you add several subtemplates with `plonecli`.