Introduction

DSH’s extension model is “everything is a plugin.” While there are many plugins in the community directory, the classifications, terminology, and metrics can be difficult to navigate. dsh-plain-plugin-menu is a community plugin for DSH released by 4mForAI. Its goal is to reclassify community plugins using plain Chinese and place them at the bottom of the DSH Web UI’s left sidebar, enabling users to search, compare, install, uninstall, and manage the plugin dependencies of the current profile.

It is not the official app store for DeepSeek or Hillhouse, nor does it replace the DSH official sidebar. It registers a “plugin menu” entry via DSH’s sidebar.footer.action, allowing users to directly manage the community plugin directory from the web interface.

Positioning

  • Name: dsh-plain-plugin-menu
  • Maintainer: 4mForAI
  • License: MIT
  • Category based on plugin metadata: Client-side
  • Entry Location: Bottom of DSH Web UI left sidebar
  • How it works: Registers to DSH’s sidebar.footer.action, does not replace the official sidebar

What Problems Does It Solve

If you are already using DSH Web but often encounter these issues when dealing with community plugins, this plugin offers a straightforward solution:

  • Plugin names and English descriptions are hard to understand;
  • You don’t know which category a plugin belongs to;
  • You want to see public metrics like GitHub Stars, recent maintenance time, and License;
  • You want to search by name, function, author, repository, or topics;
  • You want to directly install or uninstall a plugin;
  • You want to see which plugins are running in the current profile and which need to be restarted to load.

Core Capabilities

Here are its verified main capabilities:

  • Reclassify community plugins using plain language and place the entry at the bottom of the Web UI left sidebar.
  • Read the installable manifest of awesome-dsh-plugin online; the current offline snapshot contains 824 items.
  • Display GitHub Stars, recent maintenance time (pushed_at), License, archived status, Fork, and Issue data.
  • Search by name, function, author, repository, and topics.
  • Sort by Stars, recent maintenance, recently added, or name.
  • Call the current DSH launcher’s dsh plugin --profile web add/remove for installation and uninstallation.
  • Read the actual dependencies of the current profile and distinguish between “running”, “load after restart”, and “normal dependencies”.
  • Fallback to the directory and GitHub metrics snapshot published with the package when the network fails.
  • Provide both Chinese and English following DSH’s current language setting.

Installation and Activation

First, confirm that your Node.js version meets the requirements: Node.js 22.19+ or 24+.

Then, use the DSH CLI to install the plugin and start the web interface:

npx -y @deepseek-ai/dsh plugin --profile web add dsh-plain-plugin-menu
npx -y @deepseek-ai/dsh web

After successful installation, “Plugin Menu” will appear at the bottom of the left sidebar. Changes to the plugin collection require a DSH restart to be reflected in the next Web startup list; the menu will clearly display this status.

Configuration

When you need to change the configuration, override the entire line in the profile’s own cordis.patch.yml using the same id. The DSH patch will replace the entire config and will not perform a deep merge, so please re-specify all fields.

The optional environment variable GITHUB_TOKEN is used to increase GitHub API quota. The plugin only puts it in the Authorization request header for GitHub and does not send it to the browser.

Security Boundaries and Limitations

You need to clarify its operating boundaries before use:

  • Installing plugins calls pnpm outside the DSH process; third-party installation scripts and plugin code are not protected by the agent sandbox.
  • Installing and uninstalling calls the current DSH launcher’s dsh plugin --profile web add/remove.
  • Only installs sources that are in the community installable manifest and can be converted to a standard npm package name or a restricted github:owner/repo[#path:/subdir].
  • Direct installation of archived repositories is not allowed.
  • Stars, recent maintenance time, and License are only public signals, not a security audit or quality assurance.
  • The official DSH is currently still in developer preview, with clear warnings of breaking compatibility changes; integration tests need to be re-executed after a DSH upgrade.

Therefore, before installing community plugins, you should still manually check the source code, author, release history, and installation scripts. In production environments, do not rely solely on the public metrics displayed in this menu for security judgments.

Applicable Scenarios

It is quite suitable for the following situations:

  • Want to quickly browse community plugins in DSH Web using Chinese;
  • Want to compare public signals like Stars, recent maintenance, License, Fork, and Issues of plugins;
  • Want to manage the plugin installation, uninstallation, and dependency status of the current web profile;
  • Need to fallback to the directory and GitHub metrics snapshot published with the package when the network is unstable.

It is not very suitable for the following situations:

  • Hope to treat Stars, License, or recent maintenance time as security audit results;
  • Hope to automatically install untrusted scripts without checking the source code;
  • Hope to describe this directory as the official app store for DeepSeek or Hillhouse.
  • GitHub Repository: https://github.com/4mForAI/dsh-plain-plugin-menu
  • Directory page provided by plugin metadata: https://www.skillhub.cn/plugins/4mForAI/dsh-plain-plugin-menu