Hey,

Yep, I saw the discussion on SOLR-18079.

And I love some of the improvements suggested there (and in this mail
thread): treating the feature as "experimental", making the file
syntax similar to solrconfig.xml, expanding it to cover other plugin
types, etc.  I'm +1 to all of that.

I guess the particular bit I'm unconvinced about is that the
base/parent file should be something users (even advanced ones)
specify on a per configset basis.  Is that **really** something folks
are going to need?  Or would the "single base/parent for all cores"
approach that we have today with ImplicitPlugins.json actually work
pretty well if (1) it was moved to "server/etc" or somewhere that
admins could edit it, and (2) it covered other plugin types like
responseWriter, etc.

It seems like that addresses Eric's initial use-case here and most of
the other ones I could imagine.

Best,

Jason

On Wed, Jan 28, 2026 at 9:32 AM David Smiley <[email protected]> wrote:
>
> Jason,
>
> Hopefully you found/read https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/SOLR-18079
> (which precipitated Eric's email) especially my first comment.
>
> You will see that I am *also* concerned about exposing a file that I don't
> think is meant for public consumption.  My compromise (Jan agrees)  is to
> deem this file internal/experimental, and I'm placated but we'll ideally
> want something better someday.
>
> FWIW I don't like the idea of declaring a handler disabled/deleted in some
> way.
>
> Instead, I'd rather see a file that we *do* like, maybe a file that meets
> the syntax of solrconfig.xml, and use this file to configure what's in
> ImplicitPlugins.json albeit instead in XML using a schema we
> document/support/understand.  What's new would be a kind of inheritance
> mechanism to indicate the relationship between two files of
> solrconfig.xml's syntax & schema -- the one that is for the configset, and
> another that is a root/inherited one.  I have some loose ideas on configset
> inheritance here: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/SOLR-17816
> If we embark on such a road, I think a real up-front design is warranted.
>
> ~ David
>
> On Wed, Jan 28, 2026 at 8:20 AM Jason Gerlowski <[email protected]>
> wrote:
>
> > Hey all,
> >
> > Sorry for joining this discussion late.  I only caught it after seeing
> > the PR Eric linked above and getting curious.
> >
> > I guess the main point that I want to interrogate a bit is: do we
> > *really* need the ability for folks to customize these built-ins on a
> > core-by-core basis?  Or are we designing for a use-case that may not
> > exist in practice?  Someone disabling (e.g.) CSV everywhere for
> > security reasons makes sense to me.  But it's harder for me to picture
> > a case where a user would absolutely *need* to disable one of our
> > built-ins, but only on select cores.  Have we seen that in the field
> > anywhere?
> >
> > If that wrinkle disappears, I think it'd hugely simplify what we need
> > to do here.
> >
> > Eric's current PR to add more "types" to ImplicitPlugins.json seems
> > like an excellent first step.  But I worry about the complexity of
> > some of the subsequent steps, particularly letting users define their
> > own ImplicitPlugins.json in each configset.  It's the sort of thing
> > that makes sense to us devs with deep knowledge of how Solr exists
> > today, but that IMO would be really inexplicable to a new user.
> > "Wait, what is this ImplicitPlugins.json thing?  It defines per-core
> > plugins?  But isn't that what solrconfig.xml is already for?  How do I
> > know what goes in each one?"
> >
> > I'm not vetoing that route necessarily, but I want to make sure it
> > serves a real use case before we start down that road.
> >
> > Best,
> >
> > Jason
> >
> >
> > On Tue, Jan 27, 2026 at 11:13 AM David Eric Pugh via dev
> > <[email protected]> wrote:
> > >
> > >  We've made good progress ont he first part of the work:
> > https://github.com/apache/solr/pull/4073.     I plan on merging this
> > soon, and then rolling out a second PR that lets you customize per
> > configset what query response writers and request handlers are configured.
> > >
> > >
> > >     On Friday, January 23, 2026 at 12:08:49 PM EST, David Eric Pugh via
> > dev <[email protected]> wrote:
> > >
> > >   I'm going to modify the existing
> > https://github.com/apache/solr/pull/4073 to move in the direction of
> > having a BUILTIN set of ResponseWriters seperate from the ones you access
> > via the core.
> > > As far as the fourth item, yeah, maybe it's not needed when you have the
> > ImplicitPlugins.json loaded from configset.   It seems a bit odd that you
> > can't delete those items when we have this configoverlay concept.  Feels
> > like if you can create things then you would also expect to delete things,
> > regardless of how they are created.  The code didn't seem that convoluted
> > https://github.com/apache/solr/pull/4066/files.
> > > However, if it's a just me thing, then totally get it.   My underlying
> > usecase doesn't require it either.  It just felt odd that I couldn't delete
> > something after starting Solr up that appeared to be a configurable type
> > thing.
> > >
> > >
> > >     On Thursday, January 22, 2026 at 04:38:30 PM EST, David Smiley <
> > [email protected]> wrote:
> > >
> > >  I realize my thoughts on QueryResponseWriters being misplaced doesn't
> > really matter for 10.x and prior.
> > > I think your proposal for segmenting them is fine, but please declare
> > the BUILTIN ones *not* in SolrCore.  It's a detail; happy to code review.
> > We can change what's built-in and not over time.
> > > On Thu, Jan 22, 2026 at 3:32 PM David Smiley <[email protected]> wrote:
> > >
> > > Thanks for discussing these things...
> > > On Thu, Jan 22, 2026 at 2:05 PM David Eric Pugh via dev <
> > [email protected]> wrote:
> > >
> > > However, I wanted to bring this to the larger dev community for
> > disucssion.
> > > Here is what I'm thinking:
> > > 1) Separate out the existing SolrCore.DEFAULT_RESPONSE_WRITERS that
> > holds all the response writers into two groups.
> > SolrCore.ADMIN_RESPONSE_WRITERS would contain the json,javabin,
> > prometheus/openmetrics, and maybe xml writers as they are used across Solr
> > outside of a core.   The rest of the writers would continue to live in
> > SolrCore.DEFAULT_RESPONSE_WRITERS.
> > > 2) Then, migrate DEFAULT_RESPONSE_WRITERS response writers that are core
> > specific to using the existing ImplicitPlugins.json file for
> > configuration.   This would centralize a bit where we create our defaults.
> > >
> > >
> > > RE 1 & 2:  Why separate some from others?  Assuming we desire this
> > separation, I don't think "ADMIN" would be the distinguishing word... more
> > like "BUILTIN".
> > > I'm surprised that response writers even exist at a SolrCore level.
> > I've known this but have felt it makes no sense.  They are consulted at
> > HttpSolrCall level (above individual cores).  I see it as very awkward how
> > it reaches into the core to get one, and has to make special accomodations
> > for admin/internal situations.  To me, they should be node level plugins,
> > not changeable/configurable at core/configset level.  The current situation
> > is probably an accident of history, one that wasn't thought through.  IMO
> > registering/customizing them should be in solr.xml.
> > > 3) Add support for a configset level "ImplicitPlugins.json" file that if
> > it exists is used instead of the global "ImplicitPlugins.json", which would
> > allow me to remove the CSV related handlers and query response type.
> > >
> > >  +1 (naturally; my idea).  Albeit the name/format/existence of this file
> > is something I'd like to be deemed as "experimental" / subject to change.
> > >
> > > 4) Enhance configoverlay.json  to allow you to delete any request
> > handlers or request writers and track that deleted status in the
> > configoverlay.json file, which would offer up a full lifecycle via the
> > config API.
> > >
> > > Ehhh, -1 veto; because it appears needless given a user-definable
> > ImplicitPlugins.json.  I think it's simpler to code/maintain/document that
> > you can only delete a plugin that you register with that API.  AFAIK that's
> > how it works now but correct me if I'm wrong.
> > >
> > >
> >
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