cmd plugin dev

nself plugin dev

Start a plugin in development mode with hot-reload.

Synopsis

nself plugin dev <name> [flags]

Description

Wraps the plugin SDK's dev-watch.sh script to give plugin authors a first-class inner development loop. On first run, auto-links the plugin directory into the ɳSelf shadow registry so changes are picked up immediately on the next nself build.

Prefers air for hot-reload. Falls back to fswatch polling if air is not installed. Falls back to a bundled inline watch script if neither is available.

Flags

Flag	Default	Description
--no-link	false	Skip auto-link step (manage linking manually)
--debug	false	Attach dlv debugger (delegates to nself plugin debug)
--entrypoint	./cmd	Plugin entrypoint directory passed to dev-watch.sh

Examples

# Start hot-reload watcher with auto-link
nself plugin dev myplugin

# Skip auto-link (plugin already linked)
nself plugin dev myplugin --no-link

# Start with debugger attached
nself plugin dev myplugin --debug

# Custom entrypoint
nself plugin dev myplugin --entrypoint ./cmd/server

Output

Starting myplugin in development mode...
Plugin path: /home/user/plugins/myplugin
Auto-linking myplugin...
Plugin linked.
Using watch script: /usr/local/share/plugin-sdk-go/devkit/tools/dev-watch.sh
Entrypoint: ./cmd
Watching for changes — press Ctrl+C to stop.

Prerequisites

Install air for the best hot-reload workflow:

go install github.com/air-verse/air@latest

Or install fswatch (macOS):

brew install fswatch

See Also

• cmd-plugin-link, link a local plugin directory
• cmd-plugin-debug, attach dlv debugger
• cmd-plugin-test, run plugin test suite
• cmd-plugin-logs, tail plugin container logs
• Home