Activating and Deactivating Plugins — a practical guide to activate deactivate WordPress plugin with clear examples you can reuse in real projects.
WordPress Plugin Development Series (7/95). Prefer one article? Read the complete WordPress plugin development tutorial.
Short description
Activation should set defaults and capabilities carefully. Deactivation should stop running features but usually keep data unless uninstalling.
Lifecycle note
Activate → setup defaults, flush rewrites if needed
Deactivate → pause features, keep data
Uninstall → remove options/tables (only if intended)