I would like to know whether plugins (such as the OpenNTF Extension Library) need to be manually installed on any Notes Client that will be using an XPages in the Notes Client Application (XPiNC) that is dependent upon those plugins.
According to the Mastering XPages book, page 500 in the XPages in the Notes Client Chapter:
XULRunner will cache the usual resources used on the XPage but the Java classes still need to be loaded across the network for each new notes session
I understood this to mean that if there are plugins, such as the OpenNTF extension library, that they would be sent across to the Notes Client so that these dependencies would be resolved, allowing the user to use the application in the notes client, without worrying about having updating or not.
I have configured the UpdateSite.nsf on the server (8.5.3) for the dynamic loading of plugins when the HTTP server starts, this is working fine for the XPages being accessed through a web browser. However only clients that have had the 8.5.3 Upgrade pack applied (which includes the OpenNTF Ext Library), are able to access the application using the client.
It seems to me that it will be very cumbersome. The benefit of XPages would be gradual migration from the Client to Web, but to have to worry about plugin dependencies on everyones machine would be a backwards step?
Yes! You have to install extension lib plugins on clients for xpinc. You can use the update pack given by IBM or create a widget, put it in your widget catalog and then deploy it using policies or ask users to do it manually.
Stephen H Wissel has listed the steps to do this on his blog. http://www.wissel.net/blog/d6plinks/SHWL-8GZM9A
You have to deploy the plugins to the client, if you want to use the plugins in XPINC apps, as far as I know.
