Extender Script

If you have downloaded a TWiki extension, and the installer script tells you that you need tools/extender.pl then you have come to the right place.

1. Download the attached script
2. Rename it extender.pl
3. Move it to the tools directory below your TWiki installation root (create the directory if you need to)
4. Make sure the permissions are right so that the webserver user can read the script (it does not need execute permission)

Nerdy details: TWiki 4.2 now ships with a built-in module that is used by extensions installers. This module is loaded by the installer, and does most of the work. I resisted doing this before now because of the problem of supporting older versions of TWiki; but I have refactored the script now so it can be used with any version of TWiki-4 (and probably 3 as well, though that's untested).

-- CrawfordCurrie - 24 Sep 2007

Discussion

Hi, i've installed twiki 4.1 on my debian/testing from debian repositories; but i'm not sure which is the TWiki installation root. Please an advice, how can i determine it?

-- DavidGaydou - 21 Dec 2007

It should be the directory above the TWiki bin directory (where the TWiki scripts are located).

-- CrawfordCurrie - 22 Dec 2007

Hi, i've put a copy of extender.pl script on the following directories: /usr/lib/cgi-bin/twiki/tools/extender.pl /usr/share/twiki/tools/extender.pl /var/lib/twiki/tools/extender.pl /var/www/twiki/tools/extender.pl and i've changed permitions to a+rwx. When i execute: perl MailerContrib_installer it still doesn't find the extender.pl script. Is there any switch to know where does MailerContrib_installer is looking for the extender.pl script or to tell it where i've put it. Greetings

-- DavidGaydou - 22 Dec 2007

-- DavidHunter - 12 Feb 2008

I had the same trouble. Resolution - The install script being run needs to be in the root Twiki directory. The script looks to the relative path for the 'tools' directory containing extender.pl.

-- DavidHunter - 12 Feb 2008

I too have the same issue. I use RHEL 4.0. I have the extender.pl in the /tools and even did chown apache:apache * -R, chmod +x * -R, to update all the files in the twiki folder accomodate the user-id that is used by the webserver.

It continues to fail with same message. I thought it would take relative folder,so went ahead and copied the tools folder into the bin..(where the plugins are getting installed) but still no luck.

Can anybody suggest what has to be done to get this working with TWiki-4.2.0

-- SrikanthKrishnamachary - 17 Apr 2008

Let me know if the just-uploaded fix improves things. For the path problem you'll need the following additional patch:

===================================================================
--- twiki/branches/TWikiRelease04x02/lib/TWiki/Configure/UIs/EXTEND.pm   2008-06-17 16:27:00 UTC (rev 16900)
+++ twiki/branches/TWikiRelease04x02/lib/TWiki/Configure/UIs/EXTEND.pm   2008-06-17 16:30:29 UTC (rev 16901)
@@ -153,6 +153,7 @@
         print "<pre>\n";
         eval {
             no warnings 'redefine';
+            unshift(@INC, '.'); # needed to find tools/extender.pl
             do $installScript;
             use warnings 'redefine';
             die $@ if $@; # propagate

easy enough to apply manually, otherwise I'm afraid it will continue to misbehave until 4.2.1 is released.

-- CrawfordCurrie - 17 Jun 2008

When trying to run "perl WysiwygPlugin_installer" I receive this error: Could not load installer script from tools/extender.pl. If this is a TWiki release prior to 4.2, please download the latest version of the script from: http://twiki.org/cgi-bin/view/Codev/ExtenderScript and place it in the 'tools' directory below your installation root (create the directory if necessary). If this is TWiki 4.2 or later, the script is missing from your installation, or may be broken.

I'm running version 4.1.2 of TWiki, I have installed the latest version of extender.pl in the tools directory, and the permissions are correct, but I keep receiving this error. Any ideas what the problem might be?

-- VictoriaScallan - 07 Jul 2008

Victoria, is your TWiki installation directory "conventional" in the sense that you can cd to the bin directory, and then cd ../tools to find the extender.pl script? If not, then configure may not be able to locate the extender script.

I so, i would recommend installing from the command-line. The WysiwygPlugin and TinyMCEPlugin don't have special post-install scripts and can be installed by simply unwrapping the archives at the root of the TWiki install.

BTW please ask support questions like this in the Support web.

-- CrawfordCurrie - 09 Jul 2008

hmm, I've the same problem as Victoria on my shared hosting. Fresh installation, nothing added, nothing changed,=extender.pl= is in tools and permissions are correct.

-- CarloSchulz - 22 Sep 2008

Victoria / Carlo: You have to check your @INC path (from the configure script, CGI Setup, 3rd entry). This should contain the path to your tools/extender.pl (all but the /tools/extender.pl). If it's not there, then you might have to tune LocalLib.cfg to add the path into the @localPerlLibPath variable. See also: TWiki:Support/ConfigureCouldNotLoadExtenderPl

-- OlivierRaginel - 22 Sep 2008