Improved Karma Plugin with Graphical Rating Bars!

judebert · Post by **judebert** » Mon Feb 11, 2008 5:34 am

I've been working on this for three weeks now, almost non-stop. It's finally ready: the improved "karma" plugin!

The most requested new feature, graphical rating bars, was implemented first by Gregman; I picked it up from there and converted the code to a robust pure-CSS solution.

I added a preview in the plugin configuration, so you can see what all the available rating bars will look like. You can even change the background to match any page you'll be putting the bars on.

After that, I also simplified the code, made it more efficient (even Grandma would be happy with the way we frugally spend her performance pennies), and added commentary everywhere.

I added options to change how the graphical bars are displayed: whether various text decorations are shown, whether the current rating and hit count will be displayed, and a minimum number of votes and visits to be made before the ratings are shown (nothing sadder than a single vote on a good entry).

Finally, I made it easier to configure: you won't need to modify the language files just to change the text displayed by the bar. Instead, you can make those changes directly in the plugin configuration.

For those who like the textual version, full backward compatibility is provided, but there are still improvements: you can change the text of the voting links directly in the plugin configuration.

I'd like to thank Don Chambers for his invaluable help. Thanks also to the beta testers, especially Garvin, Grischa, and YellowLed; their suggestions were much appreciated.

The plugin will be available in the next nightly build of Serendipity 1.3. You can find more information and download the improved Karma Plugin from my website.

CeKay · Post by **CeKay** » Mon Feb 11, 2008 5:28 pm

Sounds great. But i never heart of the "karma" plugin

Should be explained for newbies and maybe an example how it is implemented somewhere and what it does would be nice.

thx

Post by **Don Chambers** » Mon Feb 11, 2008 6:08 pm

The karma plugin is one of s9y's core plugins - meaning it is shipped with s9y, but not installed. To install it, open admin -> configure plugins -> Click here to install a new event plugin -> Karma.

The plugin allows visitors to rate your entries. Good/bad, helpful/not helpful, I love it/I hate it, etc...

Great job Judebert on the revisions!!! I think we will see many s9y installs using this plugin!!

judebert · Post by **judebert** » Mon Feb 11, 2008 7:12 pm

If you'd like to see the karma plugin in action, just visit my website: http://www.judebert.com/. The smileys are placed on the articles by the karma plugin.

The "popular entries" plugin works with the karma plugin to show your visitors which entries are most interesting. That's what I'll be looking at next, if there's enough interest.