[annotator-dev] integrating the Annotator with Wordpress

Sat May 28 11:53:47 UTC 2011

On 27 May 2011 21:13, Mark MacGillivray <mark at odaesa.com> wrote:
> hi Andrea,
>
> thanks for working on the project! However I have some questions
> regarding the aim of making annotator a wordpress plugin. I am not
> trying to put you off - just discussing!
>
> The annotator code can already quite easily work on any website, it
> can be added in with one line of javascript or used as a bookmarklet /
> greasemonkey script. What more would you need to do to integrate it
> with wordpress than for the plugin just write the necessary line of
> javascript in the header?

The logic here is that you don't want users of the site to have to
have installed the bookmarklet (that's a significant hurdle for many).
By having a plugin the annotations can be enabled by the site owner
and can integrate with user management etc on wordpress site (in a
similar way to how this works on OpenShakespeare.org -- annotations
are auto switched on OpenShakespeare.org w/o a user having to use the
bookmarklet).

Create the plugin is in order to make this a 'one-click' setup.

> Also, this might be of interest for you to look at:
>
> http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/digressit/

Yes, we know this and its predecessor ('commentpress') well.

> It is a wordpress plugin that enables commenting by paragraph.
> However, it is not very flexible to use, and requires a fair bit of
> document prep before functioning properly. It is used, for example, at
> writetoreply.org.

Main difference is that in this setup you have more granular
annotation, no need to interfere with underlying html or to take over
comments / add new tables. The plugin based on annotator won't touch
your underlying html and will store annotations (by default) in
annotateit.org (though one could imagine a more sophisticated plugin
that stored locally).

> I do agree that wordpress is a great platform to develop for though,
> as it is hugely popular, so I am looking forward to seeing what you
> create.

:-)

Rufus