Moved all my sites to MarketPress

I’d definitely recommend reading this because your review doesn’t help users nor developers https://pippinsplugins.com/how-to-leave-a-good-bad-review/

I read that a while back, just calling it as I see it and I have a right to a personal opinion and I am not on the MarketPress staff.

And had been more or less happy with “it” until the ever growing 2.0.x series of “improvements”. Had to make a call to migrate 10 sites to MarketPress, or deal with a myriad of ridiculous “enhancements”. Took an hour per site with a little SQL query to migrate to MarketPress.

An update to a plug-in should provide enhanced capability, and a seamless transition without causing headaches, of which I have read more than a few… Those posts all over the place promoted me to make the decision more than anything.

Hey why be negative towards me, if you want I will document the dozens of things I would have had to do, I could start a whole new blog on the subject. Who knows what the future brings if I had stayed.

Take care I wuv you.

Additionally I have spent hundreds of dollars on extensions for “it”, be happy you got some money out of me.

I’m not being negative, I just want to get something more helpful than “nightmare 1 star”. Was it themes? Was it extensions? Was it custom code? Did you request help anywhere?

– All WT extensions and themes were upgrade for compatibility before launch
– We wrote several extensive blog posts outlining upcoming changes before launch
– We wrote several guides on updating custom plugins, gateways etc before launch
– We released several beta versions and release candidates to give everyone time to prepare, months in advance
– We recommended testing all custom code before upgrading sites to 2.x

So really, if advice was followed, all nightmares could be avoided. Sadly it seems many people have simply ignored all preparations we’ve made, upgraded without testing thinking everything will be fine between major releases, and then cried fowl when things break.

Well you guys always like to blame the theme, it accounts for 90% of support posts. In my case it was not the “theme” I make them so I would know.

I just had no intention of taking a chance and getting myself in a pickle by updating, so I didn’t even want to try. My experience with a new install prior to 2.0.x.x.x.x.x was less than spectacular, so like I said I made a call to not upgrade or use it. Ever again. So the one star is failing to provide a seamless transition when a lot could be at stake.

I am not crying fowl, just expressing an opinion. After reading Brian K’s upgrade document I said “what?” why do I even have to go through all of this nonsense to update a silly plug-in. And generally I don’t need support so I didn’t post anything and didn’t want to hear that it was my theme.

And also your recommendation to create a separate development install prior to upgrading was the last straw, never heard of such a thing. I don’t have time to fuss with things like that Didn’t inspire confidence in me, more like “better test it, cuz we ain’t sure”

There is more here than the guy who started WordPress yesterday can’t figure it out and gives a theme/plugin author 1 star, I know “those” people.

Are you done yet?

Craig,

I’m going to jump in here as a 3rd party that is in no way affiliated with WooCommerce or anything WooThemes. I have not even used WooCommerce 2.0 (I have used previous versions) so none of my feedback is related to the plugin at all. I was simply notified of this thread because I have an alert setup that emails me anytime my name or URL is used (the post Mike linked to is one I wrote).

As a plugin developer that spends an extensive amount of time supporting customers, I’d like to throw a few notes out:

1. Saying things like “you guys always like to blame the theme” is not particularly fair, simply because 95% or more of valid support tickets are in fact caused by poorly coded themes or plugins. Your themes (which you’ve said you wrote) could be absolutely top-notch, but Mike, nor any other person helping you, has any way of knowing that without seeing the code. Also remember that even top notch work has bugs and can cause unexpected conflicts.

2. As plugins evolve, there are often times when radical changes are needed. A lot of times things that were constructed with v1.0 simply do not work any more or are built such that they do not permit further expansion. When this happens, there will always be upgrade pains, but they are necessary in order to permit further development and improvement. Remember, I personally know nothing about what the exact changes in WooCommerce 2.0 were, I’m simply looking at this from a developer’s perspective.

3. To say version 2.0 is terrible without ever upgrading a single site is simply over the top. If you want to rate something one star because of specifics, then give them. The upgrade notes may look scary or likely to cause problems, but basing a poor rating off of the “potential to break” is simply not fair.

4. Having a dev site is one of the single best things you can do, especially if your are running sites that are processing large dollars in ecommerce transactions. It would be highly unwise to NOT have a dev site, not matter how stable your ecommerce platform is. Many hosts (such as WP Engine) even provide the ability to “generate” a dev/staging version of your site with a single click.

For plugin developers, such as Mike, to suggest you have a dev environment is not extremely at all. Not in the least. He’s suggesting that you make a very, very wise move. Developers can test plugins on dozens or hundreds of sites and not even get close to accounting for all possibilities. The point of a dev site is not to catch what the developers didn’t test for, but to catch what the developers couldn’t account for. This is a very fundamental difference.

O hey pippin I use and have purchased a few of your plug-ins and have a great deal of respect for you and follow you on twitter etc.

I am confused are these ratings here to use democratically or are you both saying I am stupid and have no idea what I am doing so I am not entitled to comment? In fact I have been using “it” since the beginning and know it quite intimately. Why beat up on me when there are 100’s of negative comments out there, and on the woo forums.

I (me) made a decision not to upgrade because of all the ridiculous things I read and did not want to even try. Smart of me I think. I took the time to migrate to MarketPress for my clients sake. I had to eat all the time doing this, and I felt is was the lesser of two time commitments. I was right. I have paid some decent money into Woocommerce extensions and felt like I do not need to risk taking a chance of bringing someone else’s site down. Sorry for thinking on my own.

Who’s next Matt, Adii?

I am not going to comment on your list of reasons why I should do this or that it seems condescending and have no idea why you needed to pick on lowly old me.

I made a better decision by moving to MarketPress and I am very happy with the plug-in, and the support system.

So anytime someone leaves a 1 star rating we need all the Rockstars coming out to bash the reviewer? I don’t see anywhere near the bashing of such a lowly ol WordPress enthusiast as myself.

If I am so out of line ask a WordPress admin to delete this rating, because I don’t know anything and have no right to an opinion, and live in the shadow of the plug-in gods.

No offense I have respect for you, but this is ridiculous.

Keep it coming I have some time today…

As the lead developer for a “competing” plugin (WP e-Commerce), I can vouch for everything Pippin and Mike have said thus far. We had a very similar massive update in our 3.8 cycle. It wasn’t perfect, but everything they’ve suggested and done is proper and pretty much the extent of what we as developers can do (pre-emptive education for users and developers, extensive upgrade routine QA, etc.)

Craig,

I’m not bashing you at all. Your opinions are 100% justified and I am not arguing against them. I’m not even arguing with you at all. Who knows, if I used WooCommerce I might agree with you. Since I don’t use it (yet) I cannot and will not speak on the actual problems you experienced.

I assure you, I did not pick you out of the crowd. As I said at the top, I only replied to this because I got notified of the thread when Mike posted the link to my article.

I’m not disagreeing or agreeing with your review. As I said I’ve not used the plugin. I’m disagreeing with your arguments against Mike. For example, you claimed it’s ridiculous that WooCommerce suggest you setup a dev site before upgrading. That’s not ridiculous at all.

Will you all feel better if I give it two stars? Everything you are telling me I already know I have been developing and using WordPress every day since 2.5 at least.

Who knows, if I used WooCommerce I might agree with you. Since I don’t use it (yet) I cannot and will not speak on the actual problems you experienced.

Then why comment at all? I made a judgement call and decided rate the plug-in based on the fact that with all the time and money I put onto the plug-in, I (me) felt that it was not worth the risk and have been let down. Don’t even get me going on WP e-Commerce (unless you want me to?)

So it’s good to see plug-in devs get together and join hands and sing kum bah yah. After all I really don’t know anything.

Craig,
I’m not affiliated with any of the plugin folks above – but you should note that each of these developers work with different e-commerce solutions (WooC, EDD & WP E-C). So when you hear that each of them is saying it’s not unreasonable to ask you to try a dev site (which is really a best practice), you should take that as good advice going forward, even with MarketPlace.

I don’t think anyone is calling you out of line. I think what you’re seeing is that, as a community, we’re all trying to drive the communication in the community to a place where it’s really helpful for newbies still checking things out.

What that translates to is simply this:
When you provide a low rating, follow it up with constructive feedback. This helps future readers as well as plugin developers.

Keep your one-star rating here, that’s ok.

But as someone who’s used WooCommerce, EasyDigitalDownloads, MarketPlace, and WP e-Commerce (a long time ago) I can share with you one thing you should keep in mind:

Different tools work for different situations.

I say that because you may find yourself needing to come back to use WooC at some point, and unnecessarily burning a bridge may not make a ton of sense in that case.

So just keep posting constructive feedback and you’ll earn and develop valuable relationships with plugin developers.

@craig you missed the point of my reply completely. Like I said, I do NOT care what your rating of the plugin is at all. Your rating had nothing to do with my reply. I’d suggest you re-read what I wrote.

Chris Lema speaks words of wisdom and sums up my points nicely.

Ok to with hope wrap this up, I will give the plug-in a 3 star rating, perhaps one is too rash, and sorry I did not follow up sooner a client called me to say they entered 40 new products today using MarketPress and how much easier it was and how much better the site looks.

Take care and thank you for the constructive criticism.

I won’t say anything else except that your rating itself had nothing to do with any of the responses posted. It was how you did not justify / support your rating. There’s nothing wrong with rating a plugin one star ??

It was how you did not justify / support your rating. There’s nothing wrong with rating a plugin one star ??

There is nothing in the TOS of this site that says I have to justify anything ??