Why is my own add-on not showing in the Preferences panel when installed?

Question

I made a super-simple, one script add-on that duplicates objects and moves them to a hidden 'Backups' collection. It installs and works fine, but for reasons unknown to me does not show up in the Add-Ons panel in preferences. I have a bl_info object in my script:

bl_info = {
    "name": "Quick Backup",
    "blender": (2, 80, 0),
    "category": "Object",
    "location": "Tools (N key) > QuickBackup Tab"
    "description": "Create a duplicate of selected objects and move it a Backups collection. The button will make a Backups collection if one doesn't exist"
}

What am I missing?

As mentioned in my answer, there is a spelling error in the dict you provided. You forgot to add a comma after the location entry: "location": "Path to the tool",. — brockmann, Jan 12 '21 at 11:16

brockmann · Accepted Answer · 2021-01-12T11:25:05.687

The bare minimum is adding a register() function, otherwise it won't install. Also bl_info dict has to be formatted properly, make sure the entries are separated by a ,. Easy to test using our famous Operator Simple template (Text Editor > Templates > Python > Operator Simple)

bl_info = {
    "name": "Your Add-on Name",
    "blender": (2, 80, 0),
    "category": "Object"
}
import bpy
'''
class SimpleOperator(bpy.types.Operator):
    """Tooltip"""
    bl_idname = "object.simple_operator"
    bl_label = "Simple Object Operator"
def execute(self, context):
    pass
    return {'FINISHED'}

'''
def register():
    pass
    #bpy.utils.register_class(SimpleOperator)
def unregister():
    pass
    #bpy.utils.unregister_class(SimpleOperator)
if name == "main":
    register()

Why is my own add-on not showing in the Preferences panel when installed?

1 Answers1