Plugin system availability and usage guidance

[jsntjinjin]

Background

I'm trying to create a custom OpenRouter provider plugin following the example in
examples/custom_provider_plugin, but encountering compatibility issues with the current
released version.

Issue Description

What I tried:

1. Following the official example: Used @lx.providers.registry.register() decorator and
   entry points as shown in examples/custom_provider_plugin

2. Testing with current PyPI version (1.0.5):

import langextract as lx
# AttributeError: module 'langextract' has no attribute 'providers'

3. Testing with factory approach:

config = lx.factory.ModelConfig(model_id="...", provider="...")
# AttributeError: module 'langextract' has no attribute 'factory'

Current situation:

• ✅ Example exists in source code with complete implementation
• ❌ Plugin system not available in PyPI version 1.0.5
• ❌ lx.providers.registry module missing
• ❌ lx.factory module missing

Questions

1. Release timeline: When will the plugin system be available in a PyPI release?
2. Version gap: Is there a development version I should be using?
3. Workaround: What's the recommended approach for custom providers until plugin system is
   available?
4. Migration path: When plugin system is released, will existing custom providers need updates?

Use Case

I'm building a production API that needs OpenRouter integration with LangExtract's chunking
capabilities. The plugin system would be perfect for this, but I need to know the timeline for
planning purposes.

Environment

• LangExtract version: 1.0.5 (latest on PyPI)
• Python: 3.12
• Installation: pip install langextract

Related

This relates to the plugin system discussion in #99. The community is interested in creating
providers like langextract-azure-openai, langextract-openrouter, etc., but we need clarity on
when this will be possible.

Thanks for the amazing work on LangExtract! 🚀

[aksg87]

Hey @jsntjinjin, thanks for the question!

You're right - the plugin system was merged to main about 10 hours after v1.0.5 was released, so it's not on PyPI yet. It'll be released soon after some additional tests.

For now, install from source:

git clone https://github.com/google/langextract.git
cd langextract
pip install -e .

Then you can use everything in examples/custom_provider_plugin/ - the registry, factory, decorators all work. Your OpenRouter plugin should be good to go.

The next PyPI release will include it, which should go out soon.

[aksg87]

Good news - the plugin system is now available in v1.0.6 (just released today).

pip install langextract==1.0.6

The lx.providers.registry and lx.factory modules are now included. See #130 for schema support in plugins.

I'll close this issue now. Please follow up on #99 for further discussion about plugin development.