Creating Plugins (.shellit)

Shellit Desktop features an extensible architecture allowing developers to build custom panels, server dashboards, and tools packaged as .shellit zip archives. Plugins execute within a sandboxed WebView2 (Windows) or WebKit (Linux) environment with a secure, permissioned bidirectional IPC bridge to the core engine.

Plugin Package Structure

A .shellit package is a standard ZIP archive containing:

my_plugin.shellit (ZIP)
├── manifest.json       # Plugin metadata and permission declarations
├── index.html          # Main HTML entry point
├── dist/
│   └── bundle.js       # Bundled JS application code (React, Vue, or vanilla)
└── assets/
    └── icon.svg        # 64x64 SVG icon displayed in the plugin manager

The manifest.json Specification

{
  "id": "dev.custom.cluster-monitor",
  "name": "Cluster Monitor",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "author": "Dev Community",
  "description": "Visual dashboard of cluster nodes, CPU, and RAM utilization",
  "entry": "index.html",
  "permissions": [
    "terminal:read",
    "terminal:write",
    "hosts:read",
    "sftp:read"
  ]
}

Installing & Testing Plugins

1. In development, drop your unpacked directory or .shellit archive into your local plugins directory:
   • Windows: %APPDATA%\Shellit\plugins\
   • Linux: ~/.config/shellit/plugins/
2. Open Shellit and navigate to the Plugin Manager to enable your plugin.

When loading a plugin, Shellit validates the cryptographic checksum and prompts the user to grant declared permissions (ssh:connect, terminal:write, sftp:read).