Developer FAQ: Difference between revisions

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Help for new coders

Where can I start?

Finding your way into the Moodle code
Moodle Developer Courses
MoodleBites for Developers online courses Level 1 and Level 2

Where can "newbies" to Moodle get help?

The General developer forum! Feel free to ask any question, no matter how basic or advanced. Many people ask different levels of question every day, and the community is generally welcoming and quick to respond.

How do I create a patch?

See How to create a patch.

How do I create a new module or plugin?

See

NEWMODULE Documentation
Blocks
Authentication plugins
full list of plugin types.
Also have a look at the Moodle Developer Courses.

Book: Moodle 1.9 Extension Development - Customize and extend Moodle using its robust plug-in systems by Jonathan Moore, Michael Churchward - highly recommended

Is there any information on backup and restore?

See Backup.

I can't use one of the available plug-in points to make my change. What alternative is there?

See Local customisation.

Moodle's database

Where can I see a schema for the structure of the Moodle database?

Database_schema_introduction gives a high level overview of the database schema.

Because of Moodle's modular nature, there is no single, detailed representation of the full database schema. Instead, the tables for each part of Moodle are defined in a database-neutral XML format, see XMLDB, in each part of Moodle. Look for files called install.xml in folders called db throughout the code. Alternatively, from Moodle 2.0 onwards, go to Administration -> Development -> XMLDB editor, and use the [Doc] links to see automatically generated documentation built form the comments in the install.xml files.

How to get/set information when writing new Moodle code

How do I find out the currently-logged-on user?

The global object $USER, which contains the numeric $USER->id among other things.

How do I find out the current course?

The global object $COURSE, which contains the numeric $COURSE->id

How do I insert/retrieve records in the database, without creating my own database connections?

You use the $DB object, as described in the Data manipulation API documentation.

How do I get/set configuration settings?

config table

To get config values you would typically access the global $CFG object directly, which is automatically created by the core Moodle scripts. To set these "main" config values use set_config($name, $value). The values are stored in the Moodle "config" database table, but these functions take care of cacheing on your behalf, so you should always use these rather than fetching the records directly.

config_plugin table

There is also a second table of config settings specifically for plugins ("config_plugin"). These are not automatically loaded into the $CFG object, so to fetch these you would use get_config($plugin, $name). To set them use set_config($name, $value, $plugin).

On top of those global configuration values, individual blocks may also have configuration "object" associated with it (the data is serialized and stored in the "block_instance" table). Within blocks, this data is automatically loaded into the config attribute of the block.

What is 'HEAD'?

HEAD is version control jargon for the latest version, so at the moment it means Moodle 2.0 dev version. (After the Moodle 2.0 stable branch is made, HEAD will mean 2.1 dev). Look for example, at the links at the top of http://cvs.moodle.org/moodle/README.txt?view=log&pathrev=MOODLE_19_STABLE You can get it from http://download.moodle.org/ and install it if you want to play.

How do I migrate code to Moodle 2.0?

See Migrating contrib code to 2.0

Learn more

Two online courses specifically for Moodle developers Level 1 and Level 2 are run by HRDNZ (certified Moodle Partner since 2006) specifically helping new Moodle developers get up-to-speed with Moodle development.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
+{{Template:Migrated|newDocId=/general/development/abc/faq}}
 ==Help for new coders==
 ===Where can I start?===
-See [[Finding your way into the Moodle code]].
+* [[Finding your way into the Moodle code]]
+* [http://dev.moodle.org/ Moodle Developer Courses]
+* MoodleBites for Developers online courses [https://www.moodlebites.com/mod/page/view.php?id=24546 Level 1] and [https://www.moodlebites.com/mod/page/view.php?id=19542 Level 2]
 ===Where can "newbies" to Moodle get help?===
@@ Line 13: / Line 16: @@
 See [[How to create a patch]].
-===Is there any information on creating a new module or plugin?===
+=== How do I create a new module or plugin? ===
-See [[Modules]], [[Blocks]] and [[Authentication plugins]], or the [[Developer_documentation#Make_a_new_plugin|full list of plugin types]].
+See
+* [[NEWMODULE Documentation]]
+* [[Blocks]]
+* [[Authentication plugins]]
+* [[Developer_documentation#Make_a_new_plugin|full list of plugin types]].
+* Also have a look at the [http://dev.moodle.org/ Moodle Developer Courses].
+; Book
+: [https://www.packtpub.com/moodle-1-9-extension-development/book Moodle 1.9 Extension Development - Customize and extend Moodle using its robust plug-in systems] by Jonathan Moore, Michael Churchward - highly recommended
 ===Is there any information on backup and restore?===
@@ Line 31: / Line 42: @@
 [[Database_schema_introduction]] gives a high level overview of the database schema.
-Because of Moodle's modular nature, there is no single, detailed representation of the full database schema. Instead, the tables for each part of Moodle are defined in a database-neutral XML format, see [[XMLDB]], in each part of moodle. Look for files called install.xml in folders called db throughout the code. Alternatively, from Moodle 2.0 onwards, go to Administration -> Development -> XMLDB editor, and use the [Doc] links to see automatically generated documentation built form the comments in the install.xml files.
+Because of Moodle's modular nature, there is no single, detailed representation of the full database schema. Instead, the tables for each part of Moodle are defined in a database-neutral XML format, see [[Database_FAQ#XMLDB| XMLDB]], in each part of Moodle. Look for files called install.xml in folders called db throughout the code. Alternatively, from Moodle 2.0 onwards, go to Administration -> Development -> XMLDB editor, and use the [Doc] links to see automatically generated documentation built form the comments in the install.xml files.
+See also [[Database FAQ]].
 ==How to get/set information when writing new Moodle code==
@@ Line 44: / Line 57: @@
 ===How do I insert/retrieve records in the database, without creating my own database connections?===
-Always use the "datalib" functions, such as insert_record() or get_record(). Since Moodle 1.7 these are found in lib/dmllib.php. Using these functions helps with database abstraction (e.g. running on either MySQL or Postgres) as well as maintaining a single database connection. Moodle uses ADODB for database abstraction.
+You use the $DB object, as described in the [[Data manipulation API]] documentation.
-Look at [http://phpdocs.moodle.org/19/moodlecore/_lib---datalib.php.html  the documentation for datalib.php] for the list of functions and details of use.
 ===How do I get/set configuration settings?===
-To get config values you would typically access the global $CFG object directly, which is automatically created by the core Moodle scripts. To set these "main" config values use set_config($name, $value). The values are stored in the Moodle "config" database table, but these functions take care of cacheing on your behalf, so you should always use these rather than fetching the records directly.
+;config table
+To get config values you would typically access the global $CFG object directly, which is automatically created by the core Moodle scripts. To set these "main" config values use ''set_config($name, $value)''. The values are stored in the Moodle "config" database table, but these functions take care of cacheing on your behalf, so you should always use these rather than fetching the records directly.
+;config_plugin table
 There is also a second table of config settings specifically for plugins ("config_plugin"). These are not automatically loaded into the $CFG object, so to fetch these you would use get_config($plugin, $name). To set them use set_config($name, $value, $plugin).
@@ Line 59: / Line 72: @@
 HEAD is version control jargon for the latest version, so at the moment it means Moodle 2.0 dev version. (After the Moodle 2.0 stable branch is made, HEAD will mean 2.1 dev). Look for example, at the links at the top of http://cvs.moodle.org/moodle/README.txt?view=log&pathrev=MOODLE_19_STABLE You can get it from http://download.moodle.org/ and install it if you want to play.
+== How do I migrate code to Moodle 2.0? ==
+* See [[Migrating contrib code to 2.0]]
 ==See also==
@@ Line 64: / Line 80: @@
 *[[Contributed code FAQ]]
 *Using Moodle [http://moodle.org/mod/forum/view.php?f=33 General developer forum]
-*Using Moodle [http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=55719 How does date / time in DB convert to real Date / Time?] forum discussion
-[[Category: Developer]]
+Using Moodle forum discussions:
+*[http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=55719 How does date / time in DB convert to real Date / Time?]
+*[http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=158521 Why git?]
+==Learn more==
+*Two online courses specifically for Moodle developers [https://www.moodlebites.com/mod/page/view.php?id=24546 Level 1] and [https://www.moodlebites.com/mod/page/view.php?id=19542 Level 2] are run by [http://www.hrdnz.com HRDNZ] (certified Moodle Partner since 2006) specifically helping new Moodle developers get up-to-speed with Moodle development.
 [[Category: FAQ]]
-[[es:FAQ Desarrollador]]
-[[fr:FAQ de développement]]
-[[pl:Developer FAQ]]