Essentials Plugin Template (c) 2025

License

Provided under MIT license

Overview

Fork this repo when creating a new plugin for Essentials. For more information about plugins, refer to the Essentials Wiki Plugins article.

This repo contains example classes for the three main categories of devices:

• MakeModelDevice: Used for most third party devices which require communication over a streaming mechanism such as a Com port, TCP/SSh/UDP socket, CEC, etc
• MakeModelLogicDevice: Used for devices that contain logic, but don't require any communication with third parties outside the program
• MakeModelCrestronDevice: Used for devices that represent a piece of Crestron hardware

There are matching factory classes for each of the three categories of devices. The MakeModelConfigObject should be used as a template and modified for any of the categories of device. Same goes for the MakeModeleBridgeJoinMap.

This also illustrates how a plugin can contain multiple devices.

Cloning Instructions

After forking this repository into your own GitHub space, you can create a new repository using this one as the template. Then you must install the necessary dependencies as indicated below.

Dependencies

The Essentials libraries are required. They referenced via nuget. You must have nuget.exe installed and in the PATH environment variable to use the following command. Nuget.exe is available at nuget.org.

Installing Dependencies

Dependencies will be automatically installed when

Instructions for Renaming Solution and Files

See the Task List in Visual Studio for a guide on how to start using the template. There is extensive inline documentation and examples as well.

For renaming instructions in particular, see the XML remarks tags on class definitions

Build Instructions (PepperDash Internal)

Generating Nuget Package

A nuget package is automatically generated when the plugin is build. To modify the name and other details of the package, edit the following properties in the .csproj file:

1. PackageId - This is the name that will be used to pull the package from Nuget once it's published
2. PackgeProjectUrl - This should match the URL for the plugin repo
3. AssemblyTitle - This is the dll file name that is will show on a processor when the plugin is loaded