What would it take for you to use a plugin that replaced a core feature of WordPress?

That is the question that has occurred to me this lunch time. You see, WordPress 2.8 has a new way of creating widgets, and a UI upgrade is on the cards, but what if it wasn’t? Would you use a plugin that replaced the core feature?

Now, I’m using widgets as an example because it is a particularly conspicuous set of functions. It is accessed by themes, by other plugins, and the core even creates widgets to include in it. So using a replacement system would mean choosing to forego any existing content.

This about what that means for a moment. If you have a theme, and you want to use new widgets, you need to modify the theme. If you have plugins they will need a rewrite, and the basic widgets wouldn’t work. It is fair, however, to assume that the writer of such a replacement would create new basic widgets such as the text widgets, PHP widget, calendar, search, links, and so on.

Obviously the functionality offered needs to be better; that’s a given, but how much better would it need to be?

I also wonder what kind of dilemma it would create for the core squad. There is something new and better out there but using it means removing something else that already works, is very popular, and is in constant use. By using this new plugin in favour of the original functionality you would be complicit in this dilemma.

It’s interesting don’t you think?