Beaver Builder

The Custom Module Docs Are Now Public

Justin Busa - August 5, 2015

We’ve learned a lot from the community since launching Beaver Builder. You make suggestions, we listen, we learn, and everyone wins!

Today, we made a big decision based on feedback (and criticism) from some in the community to make the custom module documentation – which was previously only available to Pro and Agency members – publicly available.

Why Wasn’t it Publicly Available in the First Place?

Our thinking when we originally launched Beaver Builder was that providing support for custom module development would be more involved than standard support. Hence, the reason we only included it in our Pro and Agency memberships (fun fact: we originally launched as the FastLine Page Builder with only Standard and Developer membership levels).

Fast forward a year later and supporting custom module development hasn’t been as time consuming as we initially thought it would be. That isn’t to say that it hasn’t been somewhat involved at times, it’s just not eating up unfathomable amounts of our day as we once thought it would.

In fact, we’ve found that most developers don’t need much support and can typically figure things out themselves. Heck, I know for a fact that some of them didn’t even need the custom module docs to figure out how they work!

Why the Change of Heart?

The biggest reason for the change of heart is that we want to encourage everyone to develop for Beaver Builder. We certainly weren’t doing that before.

Our hope is that encouraging everyone to develop for Beaver Builder will help grow the ecosystem to the benefit of everyone involved. It’s thriving now, but we can’t wait to see where it can go if even more people jump in. More Beaver Builder developers means more knowledgeable community members and (hopefully) more third party add-ons.

We’re still only providing premium support to our members, but now anyone – including those using the lite version on WordPress.org – can access the docs and examples that make custom module development much easier.

Download the Docs and Examples Today!

As of today, you can head on over to the Custom Module Documentation page on our site to read the docs and download a plugin with examples. If you’re a current Beaver Builder developer, be sure to let us know if there is anything we’re missing that you’d like to see covered and we’ll see about adding it. We also have our Knowledge Base available with information on general Beaver Builder use and additional developer resources.

Getting Started with Custom Module Development

The custom module documentation is essentially an extensive tutorial combined with a code reference that covers pretty much everything you need to know to develop Beaver Builder modules. If you haven’t already developed a module, my suggestion is to follow the steps in the tutorial and create a simple module (such as a text editor) to get a feel for how things work.

Please note that a strong understanding of PHP, JavaScript, CSS and HTML is required to develop modules. If that’s not you, but you’d like to have a custom module developed, let us know and we can refer you to someone.

Onward to the Future!

We’re really excited about this move and think that it’s the right decision for helping to grow the Beaver Builder ecosystem in the years to come. Feel free to let us know if you have any questions, comments or concerns, and as always, happy building!

19 Comments

Mitchell on August 5, 2015 at 1:25 pm

You guys have been killin it lately with the good deeds. Seriously, it looks like you guys really care about the user experience, and it shows. Keep doing what you’re doing.
- Justin Busa on August 5, 2015 at 1:30 pm
  
  Thanks, Mitchell! We really appreciate the kind words. 🙂
Tobias on August 5, 2015 at 2:13 pm

I personally hope that there will Custom Module Addons like for Visual Composer in the future 🙂
Is someone planning to offer something like that? 😛
- Justin Busa on August 5, 2015 at 2:31 pm
  
  Us as well, Tobias! 🙂 I’m not sure if anyone is planning on that, but hopefully getting the custom module docs out into the wild will help. I’m going to be writing a blog post about our thoughts on doing a Beaver Builder marketplace that should shed a little more light on the subject.
  - webmandesign on August 6, 2015 at 2:37 am
    
    I’d say I’m in for that! Currently I’ve built something similar with WebMan Amplifier plugin that integrates additional modules (or modules with advanced setup) but it works with my themes only (or any theme that supports WebMan Amplifier).
    
    However, I am certainly planning to release some addons for Beaver Builder. Not sure which ones yet, as you guys are constantly improving it and there is no need to reinvent the wheel 😉
    - Justin Busa on August 6, 2015 at 9:24 am
      
      Good to hear, Oliver. We’re strongly considering doing a marketplace for BB since a lot of people are asking for one. I’ll be blogging on the subject very soon. We’d love to have you develop some add-ons if that happens!
Pavel Hodosevich on August 5, 2015 at 7:01 pm

Super cool!
Your products makes the WP experience better than Wix, now when it moves forward to the opensource spirit it will be much better.
- Justin Busa on August 6, 2015 at 9:19 am
  
  Thanks, Pavel!
David Waumsley on August 5, 2015 at 7:32 pm

Brilliant idea. Generous and smart and exactly we so many of us put our trust in you.
- Justin Busa on August 6, 2015 at 9:19 am
  
  Thanks, David! That’s great to hear 🙂
webmandesign on August 6, 2015 at 2:40 am

Great idea, Justin! This will certainly drag more developers to BB ecosystem and will ease the integration of custom modules. Though the whole setup is easy to determine by yourself, the great help making these documentation public is in the list of available options fields you can use for the custom modules (I wish I had this back then 😉 ).
- Justin Busa on August 6, 2015 at 9:21 am
  
  Thanks, Oliver! You were one of the ones that had no problem figuring it out without the docs. 🙂 That’s part of the reason we made them public, a good developer doesn’t need them anyways!
Athlone Harris-Compton on August 6, 2015 at 5:19 am

Thank you Justin and the rest of the Beavers, much appreciated!
- Justin Busa on August 6, 2015 at 9:22 am
  
  You’re welcome, Athlone!
Bryan on August 7, 2015 at 1:05 pm

BB just keeps getting better! Thank you guys!
- Justin Busa on August 10, 2015 at 9:29 am
  
  Thanks, Bryan!
aabarker on August 10, 2015 at 8:47 am

Have you guys considered a screen sharing + whiteboard module?

Loads of education websites use screen sharing with whiteboards. Probably too big of a job for just you 4 guys on a time constraint, right?
- Justin Busa on August 10, 2015 at 9:32 am
  
  Thanks for the feedback! That’s not something we have considered but does sound like a great candidate for the marketplace we are considering for later this year. Is that something you would be interested in developing/selling?
Joel on August 13, 2015 at 1:02 am

Boum !