Update failed notifications by email

  • Floris

    (@florismk)


    3 years, 8 months ago

    I’m troubleshooting WooCommerce update fails, and am now looking for a way to get email notifications of plugin update results. With my previous hosting provider, I had detailed control over the type of email notification I received: update available, update succesful, update failed, for WordPress Core, plugins, and themes. Since I’ve moved to a different provider, those options are no longer availabe (different management dashboard). Is something like that available at all? I’d like to get update error notifications in my inbox.

    PS: I’m not looking for WooCommerce troubleshooting advice, or I’d have posted elsewhere. I’m really only looking for email notification options in WordPress Core (preferably without help of a plugin).

    • This topic was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Floris.

    The page I need help with: [log in to see the link]

Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)
  • Moderator bcworkz

    (@bcworkz)

    3 years, 8 months ago

    We get emails on successful plugin auto-updates. Are you saying this does not happen with failures? I’ve yet to experience any failures myself.

    Anyway, I believe you can send emails or do whatever from the ‘upgrader_install_package_result’ filter. Unverified, but it looks like the right filter. Failures pass a WP_Error object, an array of plugin data is passed on success. The plugin’s path is included either way as a way of identification.

    Thread Starter Floris

    (@florismk)

    3 years, 8 months ago

    Thanks, @bcworkz. Sorry, I should have mentioned that I’m looking for options, settings, or as a last resort a plugin; I’d rather not go into a code solution.

    Moderator bcworkz

    (@bcworkz)

    3 years, 8 months ago

    There are a bunch of notification plugins. I’m not sure if any address auto-update failures. If there is such a plugin, I’d expect it to be within these search results:
    https://ww.wp.xz.cn/plugins/search/notification/

    Thread Starter Floris

    (@florismk)

    3 years, 8 months ago

    So there’s no configuration for this anyhwhere in WordPress Core?

    Moderator bcworkz

    (@bcworkz)

    3 years, 8 months ago

    I knew successful update emails are sent, I wasn’t sure about failures. From your experience, I suspected no. I’ve done some digging and found this. So yes, WP should be sending failure notices.

    Do you get other admin notices? Emailing is not the most reliable process. A server can fail to reach its mail exchange for example. Did you check you mail client’s spam folder for missing notifications? Even if other admin notices do not land there, it’s still possible for update notices to be treated as spam.

    It’s possible for a theme or plugin to prevent update notifications, accidentally or on purpose. The usual debugging method of narrowing down the cause is very inconvenient to do in this case. We normally deactivate all plugins and switch to a default theme to verify no theme or plugin influence. Hard to verify plugin updates with no plugins 🙂

    Unverified, but perhaps you could induce an update by lowering the version number in the one active plugin’s main .php file (in the comment header), the file named after the plugin. I’m unsure how often the need for updates is checked, it could take a while to trigger an update, assuming changing the version number works at all.

    Thread Starter Floris

    (@florismk)

    3 years, 8 months ago

    Thanks a bundle for the detailed research! For my part, I can confirm that changing the version number triggers an update. I reduced the build number by 1 and immediately saw in the admin panel that my plugin needs an update. Panel also tells me that the auto-update is scheduled in four hours.

    Meanwhile, looking for debug.log I discovered that I didn’t actually have one, which lead me to the discovery of a syntax error in .htaccess. Corrected now, but that might actually be part of the problem. We’ll see whether the update still fails, and if it does, if an email goes out about it.

    Other admin emails do go out, btw, WordFence alerts for instance, and WooCommerce orders and such. I’m using the Post SMTP plugin for sending email. I’m just starting to realize that WordFence and WooCommerce may actually be the only emails I’m getting. Maybe I’m not getting any WordPress Core emails at all?

    PS: I’ve verified the correctness of my admin email address by changing it twice. Both times, I received the confirmation emails.

    • This reply was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Floris.
    • This reply was modified 3 years, 8 months ago by Floris.
Viewing 6 replies - 1 through 6 (of 6 total)

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