wich sdk to choose

[defaultc3l09f9r7rwf]

Hello, I will start to develop an plugin, but have to choose between plugin and scripting. Who can help me?

What pros and cons brings me to the right decision?

The scripting seems to me faster to develop, but can it make the same operations as a plugin? Where are the differences?

Can you tell me, if with scripting it is possible…

…to store a configuration persistent? (it's still there when InDesign reopend)

…to access the internet? (making rest-calls)

…to store cached images persistent?

Thanks.

[Manan Joshi · Accepted solution]

The rule of thumb that I use is use scripting SDK wherever you can unless other things like performance upsets the cart. Now there is a lot that you can achieve using scripting, the only place it falters is things like

• Capturing certain events. The events exposed to the scripting interface are limited so things like detecting when a page item has been moved or deleted can't be done using scripting.
• Extending capabilites of InDesign. Scripting can not add import feature for a new file format but C++ SDK can do it

So my advicewould be that investigate if it's possible to do what you need to do via scripting and if not then use the C++ SDK only for the portion that can't be handled via scripting, so a hybrid solution would be the most appropriate solution in most cases.

Now regarding your query listed below

• Persitent configuration storage:- Yes you can do that via scripting, there are methods like insertLabel and extractLabel that are used to write/read key value pairs on different object of the DOM. These methods are present on app, doc, pageItem etc objects.
• You can do this but the support is only limited to a socket object. You could look at another tech stack called CEP that is basically a HTML based extension for InDesign.
• Cached images:- I did not get this fully, but you can always store them on the file system and manage as per your logic needs

I hope this helps you in deciding how to proceed. Some useful links given below

https://www.indesignjs.de/extendscriptAPI/indesign-latest/#about.html

https://github.com/Adobe-CEP/CEP-Resources

https://coppieters.nz/?p=375

-Manan

[defaultc3l09f9r7rwf]

Thank you, this help's me a lot. I will try the scritping way.