This WordPress plugin can be used to dictate which plugins should, and should not be active in a given environment. This is particularly useful for when you are using version control for your WordPress site, and have plugins that need to be active for things to function properly.
To use this plugin simply copy all of the code from this repository into your mu-plugins directory IMPORTANT - This plugin MUST be used as an mu-plugin to function properly.
The main feature of this plugin is consuming json configuration files, and using that data to determine which plugins should be active for the environment.
By default, the plugin looks for config files at the following paths:
/wp-content/wp-content/mu-plugins/wp-content/plugins/wp-content/themes/{active_parent_theme}/wp-content/themes/{active_child_theme}
You can also add additional paths with the wp_plugin_dictator_config_paths filter.
Once the plugin has consumed all of these config files, it will also search for any config files within the plugins defined in these main configs, and merge them together. This allows individual plugins to define their own dependencies.
Below is a basic example of what one of the plugins.json config files. You can use the activate array to note which plugins should be recommended to be active for the site, and the deactivate array to note which plugins should not be recommended for the environment. Any plugin in the deactivate array will override a plugin in the activate array, so if a plugin is in a deactivate array in any config file on your site, it will not be recommended for the site, even if it's in an activate array in another config file.
{
"activate" : {
"wordpress-seo/wp-seo.php" : {}
},
"deactivate" : {
"debug-bar/debug-bar.php" : {}
}
}Going beyond the basic example above, you can also force a plugin to be activated or deactivated for a site. This will remove any ability to turn the plugin on or off from the admin, or through any other means (CLI or REST).
{
"activate" : {
"jetpack/jetpack.php" : {},
"wordpress-seo/wp-seo.php" : {
"force" : true
}
},
"deactivate" : {
"debug-bar/debug-bar.php" : {
"force" : true
}
}
}In addition to dictating the status of plugins within the plugin directory, you can also include plugins from a custom path. You can use the path key to set the parent directory of where the plugin is located. Then you can use the priority key for when the plugin should be loaded. 0 = mu_plugins_loaded, 1 = plugins_loaded, 2 = after_setup_theme
{
"activate" : {
"wordpress-seo/wp-seo.php" : {
"path" : "wp-content/custom-plugins",
"priority" : 1
}
}
}In addition to the config files you can also dictate plugins dynamically through code for when you need to activate/deactivate a plugin based on certain conditions. NOTE - These hooks and filters fire very early, so this needs to be done in a mu-plugin before the plugin dictator loads
add_action( 'wp_plugin_dictator_after_default_configs_built', 'wppd_require_plugin_dynamically' );
function wppd_require_plugin_dynamically() {
if ( ! defined( 'WPPD_ENVIRONMENT' ) ) {
return;
}
$plugin_config = Dictate::get_configs();
if ( 'staging' === WPPD_ENVIRONMENT ) {
$plugin_config['activate']['my-debugger-plugin/my-debugger-plugin.php'] = [
'path' => 'wp-content/custom-plugins',
'priority' => 1,
];
} else {
$plugin_config['deactivate']['my-debugger-plugin/my-debugger-plugin.php'] = [
'path' => 'wp-content/custom-plugins',
'force' => true,
];
}
Dictate::set_configs( $plugin_config );
}You can also load an entire config file dynamically if you have more than a handful of plugins that follow the same conditional.
function wppd_include_environment_config( $configs ) {
if ( ! defined( 'WPPD_ENVIRONMENT' ) {
return $configs;
}
$environment = WPPD_ENVIRONMENT;
$configs[ $environment ] = 'wp-content/configs/' . $environment . '.json';
return $configs;
}In order to enforce the dictated plugins list from the configs, you can run wp plugin dictate reset. Which should give you the following output:
Starting plugin reset...
Success: Plugins resetYou can also get the list of dictated plugins with wp plugin dictate list, which should give you an output that looks like:
+---------------------------------------------+----------+------------+-------+----------------------------------------------+------------+
| slug | activate | deactivate | force | path | status |
+---------------------------------------------+----------+------------+-------+----------------------------------------------+------------+
| ad-layers/ad-layers.php | yes | | no | | active |
| ai-logger/ai-logger.php | yes | | no | | not active |
| amp-wp/amp.php | | yes | no | | not active |
| Basic-Auth/basic-auth.php | yes | | yes | | active |
| chartbeat/chartbeat.php | | yes | no | | not active |
| co-authors-plus/co-authors-plus.php | yes | | no | wp-content/custom-plugins | active |
+---------------------------------------------+----------+------------+-------+----------------------------------------------+------------+Props to the following projects and blog posts for giving me ideas / code.