ranger
48e97862a6
Buddy is born. First commit of a new standalone WordPress plugin — the spiritual successor to the tamagotchi that once lived inside A-WP-Notes v1.1.5 (gracefully retired). Rebuilt from scratch with all the v3-discipline lessons baked in from day one. PHASE A — pet exists - Dashboard widget at WP Admin → Dashboard showing SVG character + name + mood label + four stats bars. - Dedicated admin page at WP Admin → Buddy → My Buddy (bigger view). - About page with side-by-side intro + plain-prose cards (Logbook About-page pattern carried forward). - Settings page with name-rename form + Updates panel. - Per-user state in user_meta key buddy_state (each WP admin gets their own pet, no shared state). - Inline SVG sprite renderer with three mood tones (happy/neutral/ sad) and three sizes (sm/md/lg). CSS keyframe animations: bobbing + periodic blinking. Zero image files. - Self-hosted update checker wired up from commit 1, ported from Logbook v3.3.5: /releases/latest with /tags?limit=1 fallback, 12h success cache / 1h negative cache. UI on Settings page. - dashicons-pets admin-menu icon — literal paw-print, brand match. ARCHITECTURE LOCKED FROM COMMIT 1 - Single-word brand name "Buddy" — no WP prefix, no future rebrand. - Public GPL v2+ Gitea repo (ranger/a-buddy). - Constants prefix BUDDY_*, function prefix buddy_*, text domain buddy. Clean naming throughout — none of Logbook's wp-notes-* historical-artifact baggage. - Single H1 per admin page, no nested toggle boxes, no duplicate sections — Tier-1 discipline carried forward from Logbook. - All assets local (inline SVG, plain CSS), no third-party CDN, no Gravatar-style external pings. NOT IN THIS RELEASE (planned) - Phase B — Feed/Play/Clean/Sleep interactions + cooldown timers. - Phase C — WP-cron decay + "Buddy is hungry" dismissible notices (port the persistent-dismissal pattern from Logbook). - Phase D — Multiple species (dog, dragon, sprite), per-species personality phrases. - Phase E — Site-health hook: pet stats react to wp_get_site_health() results. The killer feature. - Phase F — Pro tier (€2.99 lifetime) with custom skins + multi-pet. Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
🐾 Buddy
A friendly little companion that lives in your WordPress dashboard.
Adopt a small virtual pet that lives in your WordPress admin. Right now Buddy just exists — they bob, they blink, they show their mood. As the plugin grows, their stats will reflect how well you take care of your WordPress site itself: published posts feed them, outdated plugins make them sick, clearing spam makes them happy.
Gamifies WordPress maintenance with a bit of charm.
What this is
- A standalone WordPress plugin, GPL v2+ licensed.
- The spiritual successor to the tamagotchi feature that once lived inside A-WP-Notes v1.1.5 (now gracefully retired). Rebuilt from scratch, with all the v3-discipline lessons baked in from day one.
- Sister plugin to Logbook in the RangerHQ plugin family. Logbook is work. Buddy is play.
What it does
- Dashboard widget shows your Buddy with name, mood, and four stats bars.
- Dedicated Buddy admin page for the bigger view.
- Settings page where you can rename your Buddy and check for updates.
- Each WP admin gets their own Buddy stored per-user in
user_meta— nothing leaves your site's database.
What it doesn't do (yet)
- No interactions — feed / play / clean / sleep coming in Phase B.
- No time-based stat decay yet — Phase C.
- Only one species available right now — Phase D will add dog, dragon, sprite, etc.
- The killer feature — having Buddy's stats reflect your actual WP site health — is Phase E.
See CHANGELOG.md for the full version history and roadmap.
Install
- Download the latest release zip from Gitea.
- WordPress admin → Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin → choose the zip → Install Now → Activate.
- Find Buddy in the admin sidebar (paw-print icon).
The plugin self-checks for updates via the Gitea repo — see Settings → Buddy → Settings → Updates.
Project pace
This is a side project built at a side-project pace. No commercial pressure, no release deadlines. Issues and feedback welcome via Gitea.
Licence
GPL v2 or later — see LICENSE.