qgis utils.py appends to a dictionary / hash

Question

I am working with the QGIS code in the QGIS/python/utils.py code (that file path on GitHub).

In line 280 the method append() is used on a dictionary (initialized in line 231), which I believe is not possible.

The line is a part of a method which searches for and updates the list of available plugins.

I am getting an error when I run the method updateAvailablePlugins() (line 270):

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<input>", line 1, in <module>
  File "/Applications/QGIS.app/Contents/MacOS/../Resources/python/qgis/utils.py", line 283, in updateAvailablePlugins
    plugins.append(pluginName)  # original
AttributeError: 'dict' object has no attribute 'append'

Is this an error in the code? If 'pluginName' should be added to 'plugins' as a dictionary entry, what should the value of the key?

Something to note here is that I am able to use plugins just fine in the QGIS GUI, however I am getting this error when running the code directly in the Python console.

The end goal is to run a plugin, Time Manager, from the Python console, and this appears to be one step in the process.

Here is the github page with the full code: https://github.com/qgis/QGIS/blob/3205c96af629194fa485e072050b677dacfc7f23/python/utils.py

Answer 1

If the problem is to load a plugin inside qgis python console, you may check this code:

import qgsAffine # or another plugin modul
plugin = qgsAffine.classFactory(iface) # standard interface for register a plugin in qgis
plugin.initGui() # build the gui of the plugin
plugin.run() # open the plugin (show it's dialog window)

Here i use the plugin qgsAffine to demontrate the interface between QGIS and a plugin. Change it to whatever plugin you need. Of course it must be somewehre in the pythonpath, usually in the users plugin folder.