[wp-hackers] Plugin Upgrade Failing when using Subversion

[Mike Schinkel]

"DD32" <wordpress at dd32.id.au> wrote:
> Its possible for plugins to offer that sort of information if 
> they want to.. just not via the core, It also requires a bit 
> of fiddling in the readme's and the plugin parser, as well as 
> the API for that sort of thing in core.. and its likely to be 
> very little used.. All of my plugins present the user a list 
> of the contents of the changelog when an upgrade is available, 

Thanks for the clarification.

> granted, it doesnt offer the user the ability to ignore it 
> (Simply because, whenever I ever get a support request,
> upgrading to the latest version fixes their problem, even 
> if it wasnt a bug in the first place).

Oh I agree with you for my own personal sites. But I'm working on a project for large company and I'm subcontracting to an Interactive Agency and they have asked to lock down the exact implementation and don't allow anyone to upgrade the site, especially 'accidentally', without studying the situation and taking thoughtful and explicit (vs. adhoc) action.

Normally I prefer to fast-and-loose style of development, but when working (indirectly) for a large enterprise things need to be slow, measured, and methodical. In that case a plugin should *only* even be upgraded when they are having a problem. To put into perspective I'm finding that many of the plugins I'd planned to use I'm not going to use because everything is so tightly specified it will be easier just to code most of the functionality than to try to get a plugin to work exactly they way they want. But some plugins are still in use.

Put it this way; if their site went down because of an unplanned plugin upgrade it would be exactly what the people who don't trust open-source would use to make sure that company never again used WordPress as long as they could.  And I don't want my WordPress project to be that negative catalyst for WordPress.

> The headspace2 plugin also does it (Its where i got my inspiration
from), I've been meaning to write a blog posting on how to achieve
it..

Cool.  I'll check it out.

-Mike Schinkel
http://mikeschinkel.com