Title: Related Posts bug
Last modified: February 27, 2025

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# Related Posts bug

 *  Resolved [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/)
 * I’m experiencing an anomaly with Related Posts. It seems to occur specifically
   when two or more posts have identical titles.
 * As an example, I have two posts, both with the title “Engagement Portrait in 
   City Park”… I use the Secondary Title plugin to include the couples’ names, in
   this case “Zoe and Bernardo” and “Maggie and Levi”. At the bottom of Zoe and 
   Bernardo’s post, I see the three posts under Related Posts. Two of them are fine,
   but the one that links to Maggie and Levi’s post is messed up.
 * For that one, it displays the title as “Zoe and BernardoEngagement Portrait in
   City Park”. There are three things of note with this.
    1. It’s a link to Maggie and Levi’s post, but it’s appending “Zoe and Bernardo”
       to the beginning of the title (Zoe and Bernardo is THIS post).
    2. No space between the names and the post title
    3. Secondary title doesn’t seem to be normally used for related posts, it’s only
       in these cases where the post title is identical (and again, it appends the 
       wrong name, the one of the post being currently viewed, not the one that is 
       being linked to).
 * Now, I realize that identical titles is an SEO no-no, and for some of these affected
   posts (where there are just a handful involved), it’s no big deal to make variations
   of the title, which I’d want to do anyway to optimize for various search phrases.
   But there are several venues that I have dozens of posts for, and it’s becoming
   untenable to try to come up with that many unique variations of what is a pretty
   straightforward title… some of them are reading quite awkwardly. I’m setting 
   the less important ones to noindex, and also using Yoast’s ability set the title
   tag of the page to be different than the post title, but these don’t help the
   problem of related posts not displaying correctly.
 * The page I need help with: _[[log in](https://login.wordpress.org/?redirect_to=https%3A%2F%2Fwordpress.org%2Fsupport%2Ftopic%2Frelated-posts-bug%2F%3Foutput_format%3Dmd&locale=en_US)
   to see the link]_

Viewing 15 replies - 1 through 15 (of 20 total)

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 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18335437)
 * Hi there, [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Thanks for the thorough explanation of the problem. It sounds like a tricky one
   to untangle, so we need to narrow down the possible source of the issue methodically.
   Apologies in advance for my long reply.
 * I’ll start with some questions:
    - are the “wrong” related posts tagged and categorised accordingly? Related 
      Posts relies on that to share the most relevant posts
    - are there any other examples of this issue that you can share? That would 
      help us identify a pattern.
 * ****
   Upon checking your site (beautiful photos, by the way), I noticed that Jetpack
   isn’t well connected. Having a working connection can help us troubleshoot the
   issue. The connection is broken by a block happening at your server’s end – you
   can see it on this page, which Jetpack uses as an endpoint to “transfer” data
   between your server and Jetpack’s: [https://michaelcaswell.com/xmlrpc.php?for=jetpack](https://michaelcaswell.com/xmlrpc.php?for=jetpack)
 * There are a few ways to fix the connection and get rid of the block:
    - Report this to your hosting provider, and ensure our [IPs range](https://jetpack.com/support/how-to-add-jetpack-ips-allowlist/)
      is in your allowlist
    - Check for any security/caching plugins you may have enabled, and try temporarily
      disabling them to see if it fixes the problem.
    - Search for any firewall on your server-side that might be blocking the communication
      with the xmlrpc.php file – your host should be able to help you with that.
 * ****
   There may be something else installed on the site that’s causing problems.
   Let’s go through the following troubleshooting steps to check for that:
    - Temporarily deactivate all plugins except Jetpack to see if there’s a plugin
      conflict. If the issue is resolved with all other plugins deactivated, you
      can reactivate plugins one by one to discover which plugin is causing the 
      problem.
    - Temporarily switch your theme to Twenty Twenty-Three and see if the problem
      persists.
 * ****
   Hope that’s all clear! Look forward to your reply, and thanks in advance
   for your cooperation in sorting that out with us!
 *  Thread Starter [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18335576)
 * Hi Stef,
 * Thank you for the prompt response! I should clarify though, what I’m seeing is
   not “wrong” posts being listed (like a post for Venue A showing related posts
   that have nothing to do with Venue A)… my posts are indeed tagged and categorized,
   and all of the posts shown under related posts are relevant.
 * The problem is that in this one particular circumstance (where multiple posts
   have identical titles), it’s appending a secondary title (it appears that jetpack
   related posts does not ordinarily show the secondary title), plus it’s the wrong
   secondary title (it shows the secondary title of the post that is currently being
   viewed, not the one being linked to). That link is to a different post (one that
   is correctly matched as being related), but that link text includes the secondary
   title of the current post. Sorry, it’s confusing to explain!
 * The pattern is very clear, and I can readily replicate the issue… all I need 
   to do is give two posts the same title, and if related posts matches them up,
   the problem will be visible. Change the title on one of them, and the problem
   goes away. Here’s another example:
 * [https://michaelcaswell.com/blog/deva-cody-wedding/](https://michaelcaswell.com/blog/deva-cody-wedding/)
 * Under related posts, there’s a link to the wedding of a different couple (Marissa
   and Bradley) at this same venue, but the link text reads “Deva and CodySouthern
   Oaks Wedding” (again, Deva and Cody is not the secondary title of the post that
   this link goes to, that’s the secondary title of the currently viewed post). 
   The other two links on that page read fine (because their titles are different).
   If I change Deva and Cody’s post title, or Marissa and Bradley’s post title, 
   that incorrectly displayed secondary title will go away.
 * So, again, the workaround is to not have any identical post titles. But I’m having
   a very difficult time coming up with enough unique variations of some of these
   frequently-posted venues.
 * My blog is on a multisite server and is pretty tightly controlled (Showit), so
   I have limited ability to make changes for troubleshooting. But I’ll pass along
   what you said about the connection problem.
 * Thanks, and let me know if there’s anything else I can do to help you.
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18338190)
 * Hi there, [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Thanks for the very thorough explanation of the issue. I am glad to read that
   I have gotten it right (phew!) and that the tagging and categorising are correct–
   that rule out an issue related to that which is good news.
 * At this point, given the issue seems to be tied to the dupe titles, it’d be interesting
   to understand where this is getting triggered – Jetpack, or another plugin. That
   is why the troubleshooting is important at this stage. Depending on the outcome
   of the testing, we’ll be able to address the correct team (whether is Jetpack
   or a third-party plugin we can cooperate with).
 * I 100% understand the trouble of testing the plugin the way I explained on a 
   production site (not to mention on a multisite network!), so maybe you can get
   a staging service where you can do testing without affecting the live site. You
   can ask your host about this. If they don’t give you a staging site, you could
   try WP Staging or Duplicator:
 * [https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-staging/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-staging/)
   
   [https://wordpress.org/plugins/duplicator/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/duplicator/)
 * To troubleshoot the theme, you can use a plugin that only switches the theme 
   for the current user (leaving it as normal for any visitors), linked below: [https://wordpress.org/plugins/theme-switcha/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/theme-switcha/)
 * If you decide to try this initial troubleshooting, let us know what you find,
   and we can go from there.
 * Meanwhile, if you want to keep working with the workaround of getting different
   titles, you can prompt this to the AI assistant: [https://jetpack.com/support/improve-your-post-titles-with-ai-assistant/?utm_source=chatgpt.com](https://jetpack.com/support/improve-your-post-titles-with-ai-assistant/?utm_source=chatgpt.com)
 *  Thread Starter [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18338883)
 * Thank you again for your attention to this.
 * Unfortunately, I have no ability to install any plugins beyond what Showit has
   preinstalled, and I cannot even switch themes. But I did try disabling all other
   plugins except Jetpack (and Secondary Title, of course), and the problem remained.
 * I passed along to their tech support your comment about the connection problem
   between their server and Jetpack, and they are looking into that.
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18339077)
 * Hey [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Thanks for reporting the connection issue to your host – let’s have this sorted
   out as this can help better investigate the Related Post problem.
 * The fact that the issue persists upon disabling other plugins might indicate 
   that we might be able to take action on that: we might file a report to our developers
   once we have checked the site a bit better with the working Jetpack connection
   🙂
 * In the meantime, would my suggestion to avoid creating duplicate titles with 
   the AI generator work for you? I’m curious to know if that would help at this
   stage.
 *  Thread Starter [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18339239)
 * Yes, the AI generator could help, though it’s not totally necessary… I can (with
   some effort) come up with alternative titles. But there still leaves a chance
   that (particularly for locations where I have quite a few posts) I could miss
   some.
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18339420)
 * Hey [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * I see what you mean! Let’s fix the Jetpack connection first, so we can check 
   if it’s time to escalate it to our developers. Keep us posted!
 *  Thread Starter [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18339708)
 * I heard back from Showit… they said “We block all xmlrpc across all of our servers.
   It is considered a significant security vulnerability, exposing your site to 
   brute-force attacks and DDoS attempts due to its outdated design.”
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18342784)
 * Hey [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Thanks for the follow-up. Your host may allow xmlrpc access only to Jetpack IPs–
   it’s something possible that some of our customers already do, and it seems ot
   be working fine connection wise 🙂 You may want to give it a try!
 * Meanwhile, I changed the connection to an alternate endpoint, but we still see
   blocks at our end. This is the error:
 * `xr_-32710: parse error (local). not well formed`
 * <span style=”box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;”>I suspect the
   block isn’t 100% tied to the xmlrpc.php, but it lies within the server and can
   be addressed, and we still need our [IP range](https://jetpack.com/support/how-to-add-jetpack-ips-allowlist/)
   to be fully placed in the allow list for your servers..</span> 
   Would you mind
   reporting this to your host and see what they can do about it? It could also 
   be a `mod_sec` block, but I am just assuming as I can’t see that from our end.
 * We immensely appreciate our ‘bridge’ role between us and your host! Let us know
   how you get on ⭐️
 *  Thread Starter [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18344183)
 * Ok, they said that they have added all the IPs to their allow list, and asked
   you to give it another try!
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18344223)
 * Hi there, [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Unfortunately we still see that block at our end! 😭
   Is there any other way your
   host can check for the following?
    - any other security/caching plugins that may be enabled, and try temporarily
      disabling them to see if it fixes the problem.
    - search for any firewall on your server-side that might be blocking the communication
      with Jetpack – your host should be able to help you with that.
    - any mod_sec block or similar that might be in place
 * As a last resort, if there is any chance to enabled the xmlrpc.php only for the
   Jetpack IPs (even temporarily) to see if we can connect the plugin, it’d be great.
 * Let me know how it goes! Thanks again for bearing with us.
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18358567)
 * Hello [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Do you have updates about that, do you still need help? We usually close inactive
   threads after one week of no movement, but we want to make sure we’re all set
   before marking it as solved. Thanks!
 *  Thread Starter [michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)
 * (@michaelcaswell)
 * [1 year, 3 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18359195)
 * It’s still not resolved, but I’ve hit a dead-end with the hosting company… they’re
   not willing/able to make any changes to the server to accommodate the troubleshooting
   of the issue, and suggested that upgrading a more expensive non-multisite plan
   might (but not guaranteed) help, but I’m not inclined to do that at this time.
 *  Plugin Support [Alin (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/alinclamba/)
 * (@alinclamba)
 * [1 year, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18365970)
 * Hi [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/),
 * Thanks for your patience while I looked into this. I tried to replicate the issue
   on a test site using the Secondary Title plugin and Jetpack Related Posts, but
   I wasn’t able to reproduce the same behavior. That suggests this might be specific
   to your setup—possibly something in the way your theme or hosting environment
   interacts with Jetpack.
 * I know troubleshooting is tricky since your host has restrictions, but one option
   could be to test this on a separate WordPress install, even if it’s temporary,
   to see if the issue happens there too. If the problem only occurs on your site,
   then it’s likely something unique to your setup. If it happens elsewhere, we’ll
   have a stronger case to escalate this as a bug in Jetpack.
 * I’d love to help in any way I can—let me know your thoughts!
 * Best regards,
   Alin
 *  Plugin Contributor [Stef (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/erania-pinnera/)
 * (@erania-pinnera)
 * [1 year, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/#post-18373910)
 * Hey [@michaelcaswell](https://wordpress.org/support/users/michaelcaswell/)!
 * This is another friendly reminder to let us know if you need further help from
   us, as otherwise the thread will be closed.
 * Happy to assist you, so if you need, please reply to this message. Thanks!

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The topic ‘Related Posts bug’ is closed to new replies.

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 * 21 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [Alin (a11n)](https://wordpress.org/support/users/alinclamba/)
 * Last activity: [1 year, 2 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/related-posts-bug/page/2/#post-18381969)
 * Status: resolved