Managing plugins
Plugins extend the core functionality of MPS. For example, they can:
provide integration with version control systems, application servers, and other tools
add support for various languages and frameworks
boost your productivity with shortcut hints, live previews, file watchers, and so on
help you learn a new programming language with coding exercises and verification
Open plugin settings
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In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), select Plugins.
In the Plugins dialog, you can:
Use the Marketplace tab to browse and install plugins from the JetBrains Plugin Repository or from a custom plugin repository.
Use the Installed tab to browse installed plugins, enable, disable, or remove them. Disabling unnecessary plugins can increase performance.
Use the Updates tab to browse the plugins that require an update.
Most plugins can be used with any JetBrains product. Some are limited only to commercial products. There are also plugins that require a separate license.
If a plugin depends on some other plugin, MPS will notify you about the dependencies. If your project depends on certain plugins, add them to the list of required plugins.
If some functionality is not covered by existing plugins, you can create your own plugin for MPS. For information about developing plugins, see Develop your own plugins.
By default, MPS includes a number of bundled plugins. You can disable bundled plugins, but they cannot be removed. You can install additional plugins from the plugin repository or from a local archive file (ZIP or JAR).
Install plugin from repository
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In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), select Plugins.
Find the plugin in the Marketplace and click Install.
Install plugin from disk
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In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), select Plugins.
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In the Plugins dialog, click
and then click Install Plugin from Disk. -
Select the plugin archive file and click OK.
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Click OK to apply the changes and restart the IDE if prompted.
Custom plugin repositories
By default, MPS is configured to use plugins from the JetBrains Plugin Repository. This is where all the community plugins are hosted, and you are free to host your plugins there. However, if you develop plugins for internal use only, you can set up a custom plugin repository for them.
For information about setting up a custom plugin repository, see the IntelliJ Platform SDK documentation.
Once you set up your plugin repository, add it to MPS:
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In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), select Plugins.
In the Plugins dialog, click
and then click Manage Plugin Repositories. -
In the Custom Plugin Repositories dialog, click
and specify your repository URL. It must point to the location of the updatePlugins.xml file. The file can be on the same server as your custom plugins, or on a dedicated one. 
Click OK in the Custom Plugin Repositories dialog to save the list of plugin repositories.
Click OK in the Plugins dialog to apply the changes.
To browse the custom plugin repository, type repository: followed by the URL of the repository in the Marketplace tab of the Plugins dialog. For example:
Alternatively, you can replace the default JetBrains Plugin Repository with your custom repository URL. This can be helpful if you want only your custom repository plugins to be available from MPS. To do this, edit the platform properties or VM options file as described below. For more information, see Advanced configuration.
Replace the default plugin repository with a custom one
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From the main menu, select either or .
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Add the
idea.plugins.hostproperty to the platform properties file or the-Didea.plugins.hostoption to the VM options file. For example:idea.plugins.host="http://plugins.example.com:8080/"-Didea.plugins.host="http://plugins.example.com:8080/"Make sure that there is no plugins.jetbrains.com URL.
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Restart MPS.
If you replace the default plugin repository with your custom one, the search field on the Marketplace tab of the Plugins dialog will browse only the plugins in your custom repository.
Develop your own plugins
You can use any edition of MPS to develop plugins. It provides an open API, a dedicated SDK, module, and run/debug configurations to help you.
The recommended workflow is to use Gradle. The old workflow using the internal MPS build system is also supported. For more information, see the IntelliJ Platform SDK Developer Guide.