Repository Management with Nexus
21.3. Nexus Plugin Extension Points

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.plugins.NexusPlugin

This extension component is meant to be used in Nexus plugins only. If it is found in a plugin, it will be invoked during install/uninstall/init phases of a plugin installation/uninstallation/initialization. Typical usage would be a need to perform some specific tasks on plugin install (i.e. it uses native code to do some magic and those needs to be copied somewhere, register them with OS, etc).

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.plugins.rest.NexusIndexHtmlCustomizer

This extension is able to customize the "index.html" returned by Nexus. Using this component, a plugin is able to add markup or Javascript to the pages generated by the Nexus web application. Every plugin that has a UI component uses this extension point to add Javascript customizations to the interface.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.plugins.rest.NexusResourceBundle

This extension gathers and publishes static resources over HTTP. These resources are usually JavaScript files, CSS files, images, etc. Plugin developers do not need to use this extension directly since some of the features it exposes are automatic for all plugins. When the Nexus plugin manager discovers resources in plugin JAR under the path "/static", the Plugin Manager will create a special "plugin NexusResourceBundle" component on the fly.

If you do not want the plugin manager to automatically add a resource bundle you can define your own resource bundle implementation. The plugin manager will not add a resource bundle if:

The "default plugin" resource bundle component uses MimeUtil from core to select MIME types of resources found within plugin, and will use same path to publish them (i.e. in plugin JAR "/static/image.png" will be published on "http://nexushost/nexus/static/image.png").

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.templates.TemplateProvider

Template provider is a component providing repository templates to Nexus. Every plugin which provides a "new" repository type should add a TemplateProvider as it is the only way to instantiate a repository instance. The core of Nexus provides a "default" template provider with templates for all core repository types, and all custom repository plugins (P2, OBR) provide template providers for their types.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.events.EventInspector

Event inspectors are used to inspect events in Nexus. One example of where this extension point is used is the index generation. To generate a Nexus index, there is an event inspector which listens for RepositoryItemEvent subclasses and updates the index in response to repository activity.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.item.ContentGenerator

A content generator is a component that is able to generate content dynamically, on the fly, instead of just serving a static resource. The content generator is registered to respond to a path that corresponds to a file. When the resource is retrieved, Nexus discards the file content and uses the registered content generator to generate content. The Nexus Archetype plugin uses a content generator to generate the archetype-catalog.xml. Every time a client requests the archetype-catalog.xml, the archetype catalog is generated using information from the index.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.registry.ContentClass

Content class controls the compatibility between repository types. It defines the type of content that can be stored in a repository, and it also affects how repositories can be grouped into repository groups. Every plugin contributing a new repository type should provide an instance of this extension point. Nexus has a ContentClass implementation for every core supported repository type, and the P2 and OBR plugins define custom ContentClass implementations.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.storage.local.LocalRepositoryStorage

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.storage.remote.RemoteRepositoryStorage

A plugin developer can override the default file-based local repository storage and the default remote HTTP repository storage interface. If your plugin needs to stores repository artifacts and information in something other than a filesystem, or if your remote repository isn’t accessible via HTTP, your plugin would provide an implementation of one of these interfaces. Nexus provides one of the each: a file-system LocalRepositoryStorage and CommonsHttpClient 3.x based RemoteRepositoryStorage.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.plugins.RepositoryCustomizer

This extension component will be invoked during configuration of every Repository instance, and may be used to add some "extra" configuration to repositories. The procurement plugin uses this mechanism to "inject" RequestProcessor that will evaluate rules before allowing execution of request.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.attributes.StorageItemInspector

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.attributes.StorageFileItemInspector

Attribute storage ItemInspectors are able to "decorate" items in repositories with custom attributes. Every file stored/cached/uploaded in Nexus will be sent to these components for inspection and potentially decoration. The StorageItemInspector will get all item types for inspection (file, collections, links), while StorageFileItemInspector will only get file items. Currently only one ItemInspector is used in Nexus: the checksumming inspector, that decorates all file items in Nexus with SHA1 checksum and stores it into item attributes.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.rest.feeds.sources.FeedSource

To add new RSS feeds, a plugin may provide implementation of this extension point. Nexus provides implementation for all the "core" RSS feeds.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.scheduling.NexusTask<T>

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.tasks.descriptors.ScheduledTaskDescriptor

NexusTask is an extension point to implement new Nexus Scheduled Tasks.

If a contributed task needs UI, then the plugin which provides the NexusTask should provide a ScheduledTaskDescriptor which allows the UI customization for the task creation and management interface.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.rest.NexusApplicationCustomizer

This extension component is able to intercept URLs routed in the Nexus REST API layer.

Interface: org.sonatype.nexus.proxy.repository.RequestProcessor

This extension point can affect how a repository reacts to an item request.