Item5439: Proposal to have chapter editing off by default

Currently EditChapterPlugin is enabled for all headings by default. In fact, it is impossible to completely disable it even if one sets EDITCHAPTERPLUGIN_ENABLED to off in TWikiPreferences. The reason is that some cases, such as INCLUDED topics or heading defined in DBQUERY formats do not respect the plugin preference setting. In some cases, these edit links may be simply undesired but in other cases they do not work at all (producing unexpected results).

This introduces a high degree of unpredictability in the plugin's use.

I would make case that it would be more desirable to have it not render heading edit links by default. Then this functionality could be enabled for specific situations as desired, or the administrator could turn it on for entire site by setting the EDITCHAPTERPLUGIN_ENABLED to on in TWikiPreferences and accept the compromises this might present. This would be a more conservative approach that reduces the incidence of problems/errors. At present, there is no option but to deal with these complications across the entire site and with existing applications, even if one only wants this functionality only in a few places.

The approach I'm advocating is that followed by earlier similar plugins such as SectionalEditPlugin. That is, if one wanted to apply this to the entire site, one had to explicitly enable it. Otherwise, it was only applied where specifically enabled.

To address the concern that users would install the plugin and wonder why nothing happens, simply include notes at the end of installation instructions about enabling the plugin in a topic, web or site-wide.

-- TWiki:Main/LynnwoodBrown - 13 Mar 2008