What problem does it solve?
Extend WooCommerce stores with custom, maintainable plugins that add features without modifying core code and remain compatible with modern WooCommerce storage (HPOS) and lifecycle expectations. The Skill reduces the risk of breaking stores during upgrades by prescribing safe initialization, dependency checks, and HPOS-compatible data access patterns.
Core Features & Use Cases
- Plugin boilerplate & initialization: safe plugin header, ABSPATH guard, WooCommerce active check, and woocommerce_loaded initialization.
- HPOS compatibility & CRUD: declare HPOS compatibility and use WooCommerce CRUD methods for reading and writing order meta to support custom order tables.
- Hooks, Settings & REST: patterns for action/filter usage across order/product lifecycles, Settings API integration for admin configuration, REST route registration with permission callbacks, and custom shipping/payment/email extensions.
- Use Case: implement a fulfillment integration that triggers on order completion, records a fulfillment token on the order in an HPOS-safe manner, and exposes an admin-only REST analytics endpoint.
Quick Start
Create a plugin file with the provided boilerplate, declare HPOS compatibility before_woocommerce_init, initialize on woocommerce_loaded, and implement order lifecycle handlers that read and write order meta using $order->get_meta(), $order->update_meta_data(), and $order->save().
