There was a good looking tutorial to get started so I did. The only problem was that it didn't work. If I took their code and put it up it just broke Moodle telling me that the block had errors in it.
I initially decided that it was me and making silly typos. Having got rid of my only mistake the thing still didn't work. so I went back to basics.
This is a very simple block just to display some text. It works with Moodle 2.4.
block_testimonials.php
<?php
// This file is part of Moodle - http://moodle.org/
/**
* Form for editing banners block instances.
*
* @package testimonials Philip M Russell Ltd
* @copyright 1999 onwards Martin Dougiamas (http://dougiamas.com)
* @license http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.banners GNU GPL v3 or later
*/
class block_testimonials extends block_base {
public function init() {
$this->title = get_string('pluginname', 'block_testimonials');
}
public function get_content() {
if ($this->content !== null) {
return $this->content;
}
$this->content = new stdClass;
$this->content->text = 'BRE Training is a great place to learn how to do things properly.';
$this->content->footer = 'BRE Training';
return $this->content;
}
} // Here's the closing bracket for the class definition
Version.php
<?php
// This file is part of Moodle - http://moodle.org/
/**
* Version details
*
* @package testimonials
* @subpackage html
* @copyright 1999 onwards Martin Dougiamas (http://dougiamas.com)
* @license http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html GNU GPL v3 or later
*/
defined('MOODLE_INTERNAL') || die();
$plugin->version = 2012112901; // The current plugin version (Date: YYYYMMDDXX)
$plugin->requires = 2012062500; // Requires this Moodle version
$plugin->component = 'block_testimonials'; // Full name of the plugin (used for diagnostics)
$plugin->cron = 0;
$plugin->maturity = MATURITY_BETA;
$plugin->release = '2.3 (Build: 2012112900)';
db/access.php
<?php
// This file is part of Moodle - http://moodle.org/
/*
* @copyright 2013 Philip M Russell Ltd
* @license http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html GNU GPL v3 or later
*/
defined('MOODLE_INTERNAL') || die();
$capabilities = array(
'block/testimonials:myaddinstance' => array(
'riskbitmask' => RISK_SPAM,
'captype' => 'write',
'contextlevel' => CONTEXT_BLOCK,
'archetypes' => array(
'editingteacher' => CAP_ALLOW,
'manager' => CAP_ALLOW
)
)
);
lang/en/block_testimonials.php
<?php
// This file is part of Moodle - http://moodle.org/
/**
* @package testimonials
* @copyright 1999 onwards Martin Dougiamas {@link http://moodle.com}
* @license http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.banners GNU GPL v3 or later
*/
$string['pluginname'] = 'Testimonials block';
$string['testimonials'] = 'Simple HTML';
$string['testimonials:addinstance'] = 'Add a new simple HTML block';
$string['testimonials:myaddinstance'] = 'Add a new simple HTML block to the My Moodle page';
edit_form.php
<?php
class block_testimonials_edit_form extends block_edit_form {
protected function specific_definition($mform) {
// Section header title according to language file.
$mform->addElement('header', 'configheader', get_string('blocksettings', 'block'));
// A sample string variable with a default value.
$mform->addElement('text', 'config_text', get_string('blockstring', 'block_testimonials'));
$mform->setDefault('config_text', 'default value');
$mform->setType('config_text', PARAM_MULTILANG);
}
}
Each of these php programs is saved into a directory called testimonials and was copped by into moodle/blocks.
On loading Moodle the block was detected and I was asked to update the Moodle database. If there are any errors then this shows up straight away. Then it is necessary to remove the block and recode.
