Category: How It Is

Making philosophy about the why behind technical things.

Review: FacetWP

I’ve been using FacetWP since April 2017 and I can unequivocally say that it was one of the best purchases I’ve made.

Search Is Hard

There’s no two ways around this. Search is difficult. You have to guess what peoples’ intents are, and you have to order the results in a way that is meaningful. While it would be great if people searched for keywords, they prefer to look for things in whole phrases like “jackets made of feathers.” Those are terms and presentations that make sense to the human mind.

On top of that, there are different kinds of search.

Most people are familiar with document search, which is more or less what WordPress and Google do. Since webpages are just text documentation at the end, Google searches all the text, figures out how many people link to the page, use some secret dipping sauce, five spices, and determine relevancy. WordPress’ own search is much simpler and consequently less effective. Not that Google gets it right all the time either, though…

Another common type of search, also used by Google, is graph search. This is popular on Facebook and Twitter, but it uses connections between your friends to prioritize and determine depth of search.

Finally there’s the concept of faceted search. This is useful when a site knows you’re looking for a product, like a shoe, and you just need help narrowing down the size, the color, the fit, etc. And that’s where FacetWP comes in.

Facets vs Filters

You might have heard about search ‘filters.’ If you’ve ever used Google’s image search, or news search, and you tried to narrow down results based on dates or colors or formats, you’ve used filters. They help you filter the results by changing the parameters. A faceted search is similar, in that it uses the same concepts as filters to toggle multiple aspects of the search item, giving you even more flexibility in your results.

The term ‘filter’ and ‘facet’ are oft used interchangeably, and since they’re so similar and related, this does not help a single person at all. They both help reduce large data sets into something manageable, but filters are relatively easier than facets. In fact, your WordPress site already does basic filters. Ever gone to a category or tag page? That’s a very basic example of a filter.

Faceted Search Is Hard

If regular relational searches are hard, it shouldn’t surprise you to hear that faceted search is too. A faceted search has the job of analyzing a large data set and excluding anything that doesn’t fit your specific criteria. This means it uses multiple filters, once for each aspect of the data set.

Okay, let’s make this a little easier to understand with a practical example!

Let’s say you have a database of 750 TV shows. You’ve identified what you feel to be the key components of the shows, such air dates, countries, ratings, specific genres, and if the reviewer liked it. Now, if someone comes to your site and wants a list of crime dramas that aired between 2000 and 2017, in the US, that the reviewer hated, you don’t need filters, you need a faceted search.

By building in options to sort each of those things, you reduce the dimensions of content and offer a structure to help your users understand the contextual construct of the data. You are giving them ideas about what data is available, and how they can search through it without having to guess at keywords.

FacetWP Does All That

Simply put, FacetWP does that.

It does all of that. It even lets me add in a sort-by so once a user has narrowed down the shows, they can reorder them based on name, date added, number of characters, and show ratings. If I wanted to extend that to order based on airdate, I could do that too. People can toggle criteria on and off and the content updates dynamically

If you have a large amount of data (like 750 TV shows or 2250 TV characters), and you want to organize them sanely, swiftly, and not crash your server, use FacetWP. It even works with WooCommerce and EDD, so if you want to be the next Amazon, you need this.

7 December, 2017
Why I Do This

Every once in a while someone makes a few veiled statements about how I must be on some kind of power trip, and that’s why I took control of the Plugin Review team as the rep. It’s not true.

Why I am a Forum Moderator

I was helping people and one of the mods asked if I’d join. I said yes. I’m currently still on the team, but I no longer am super active. I’m kind of on the cusp of the requirements for being a moderator, and if they removed me, I’d be okay with that.

Why I was the Forum Representative

We were just deciding who should be the very first reps for teams, and I was asked (along with someone else) if I’d be willing to try to help us figure out how we wanted to do this. I stepped down from that responsibility after a few years to lower my personal stress.

Why I am a Plugin Reviewer

I had been reporting a bunch of plugins doing bad things, as well as helping the gents figure out some crazy stuff. They abducted me and asked me to help. I did and bit by bit learned how to properly handle reviews. I keep doing reviews because I enjoy it.

Why I am the Plugin Review Representative

No one else wanted to do it and we needed someone to take responsibility and make some changes. Like with the guidelines. The directory etc. I still do it because it’s a needed job.

But … WHY!?

None of that answers the real question of why I do this at all though. If it’s not apparent, I literally fell into this job by accident and stuck around. I stick around because I enjoy what work I do and I learn from it. Learning about how people write code, the assumptions they make, teach me more about accidental security than all the time I worked at the Bank.

But also I believe that any social organization that advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole. And to that end, I feel that the only right way to make plugin code reviews, or the forums, work is to get the community self-regulating.

The problem with that theory is that not everyone is altruistic. If people within the community have a desire contrary to the rest of the community, it causes conflict and drama. Therefore, a true ‘socialist’ society requires people willing to be the ‘baddie’ and say things like “No, you can’t do that.” Basically, we need a parent who’s able to explain to the children why putting their hands on the stove is bad, and why throwing rocks at their friend was mean.

I certainly don’t think I’m the only person who can do this. I just seem to be one of the few willing to do it in a consistent and continuous fashion. And that’s the reason I stick around. I’m trying to build a future where anyone can do technical code reviews for submitted plugins. Anyone. However that comes with a lot of responsibility for the community.

While there are many people capable of doing a technical review, and many people competent at explaining bad code to developers, and many people wise enough to handle angry developers, that Venn Diagram has a very small crossover. And if you factor in people willing do to it, it gets smaller.

For example. Everyone complains about the WordPress Plugin Guidelines being too strict and too vague. Last year I undertook the monumental effort of rewriting them for clarity and fairness. I asked people at multiple WordCamps to help. We sat and discussed what the guidelines meant and why they were worded in the way they were. Then I posted on the Make blog asking people to help.

Of the few hundred people who complained, less than 20 had anything to say.

From that, and other times I’ve reached out to the community and asked for help, and the results I’ve had, I feel that people aren’t willing to embrace all the aspects of the job. Yet. That’s why I’m slowly, carefully, working my way through the changes. I’m trying to lower the bar for them, to make them more amenable to join.

It takes time.

Yes, but that isn’t WHY!

Oh right. Why do I do this?

I review plugins because I legit enjoy seeing the crazy code people come up with. I help in the forums for the same reason. I like seeing what people do, and solving problems. I like writing the code to solve the problems too.

I’m the plugin rep because it’s a dirty job, but someone has to do it, and I’m okay with being hated by people. I know I’m doing it to make code better and safer for users, to encourage developers to engage in ethical and kind business practices, and because I learn from them too.

At the end of the day, I do this, all of this, because I can, because I enjoy it, and because I feel good when I help people.

One day that may change. When it does, I’m sure I’ll walk away. That’s just not today.

30 November, 2017
Accepting Failure

This is a difficult thing to do, so let me share some briefs of recent failures.

Failure To Launch

I recently retired a plugin. It’s a good plugin, complex and clever and does things in a wickedly smart way. And its an absolute failure because it lacked the ability to solve one problem, perhaps the biggest problem it was intended to solve.

The plugin was more complex in ways that it didn’t need to be. I spent a lot of time thinking about one use case, and I never looked far enough to think about the real world, which ended with this plugin only being used by 600 or so people, and most of them grumblingly.

Accepting my loss, I recognized that I’d coded myself into a hole, wrote uninstall code, and apologized. A lot.

Failure to Maintain

I closed my ebook store recently. Quietly. Because it was so much work to update and maintain, and it was draining me. I kept all my books on Amazon, where they sell much better with much less work, and redirected everything.

The problem was I wasn’t making enough money on it to justify it. While I had intelligently made changes to inspire people to purchase instead of download for free, and I strongly believe in letting them be free when they need to be, it’s just a lot of work. A lot. I was spending time I wasn’t earning on. Nor enjoying.

Failure to Communicate

There’s someone who hates me right now. They think I’m a terrible person, that I hate them, that I want them to fail. Because I was unable to explain sufficiently why what they were doing was wrong. I’ve tried appealing to them, offering them more exceptions and time than I usually do (ever) for a fix that should be simple.

For some reason, we just can’t bridge the gap. They won’t listen. And no matter what I say, they only see hatred in it. I can’t convince them otherwise. And yes, that smarts. It’s a terrible feeling to not have failed myself, but to have failed someone else, to the point they feel they have no recourse.

Accepting Failure

Accepting you’ve failed at something is hard. Thankfully in all three cases, I feel like I’ve learned something from them. I learned how to control my temper, how to watch the weight of my words. I’ve learned how to properly write and run an ebusiness, and why I don’t want to. I’ve learned how to gracefully degrade a plugin.

But knowing I failed still does hurt.

So all I can do is learn from it and move on.

28 November, 2017
Github Introduces Archiving

One of my laments has been that I can't (easily) flag a repository in Github as archived.

https://twitter.com/ipstenu/status/926529534580555777

As of today, you can!

Github just announced the ability to archive repositories, and yes, it can be undone.

To archive a repository, go to your Repository Settings Page, scroll down to the Danger Zone and click Archive this repository. It will pop up with a screen to warn you that this is a serious change, and while it can be undone, it will ask you to type in the repository slug to confirm.

Once you've closed the repository, you'll see it has a new banner at the top, announcing "This repository has been archived by the owner. It is now read-only."

The repository will also have a little 'Archived" badge in the regular view.

So. YAY!

9 November, 2017
18 Months Without Contact Forms
In February of 2016 I deleted my contact forms (except one).

In the subsequent 18 months, I’ve actually enjoyed it, as the cruft email in my box has dropped significantly. But it led to a few peculiar situations. You see, people do still try to get a hold of me personally , and they’ve taken to interesting methods.

Keep in mind. I’m talking about my personal contact. Not work. Work is work is work. This is basically you calling my house, not my office.

Everything Is About Plugins

Every. Single. Time.

I’m only talking about unsolicited messages. Not “We’ve been talking about X in the #meta and let’s take it to a sidebar.” And it’s not “Last week you said X was okay in #forums and I have a followup.”

I mean, literally, people I’ve never spoken to before who fall into one of two categories:
1. People looking for help with a plugin I wrote
2. People who got an email from the Plugins address
For group 1, please use the WordPress support forums. For group 2, please press ‘reply’ on your email.

But they don’t. Instead they use…

Twitter

It’s not a secret I leave DMs open on Twitter. This means, yes, anyone can DM me if they want. So far, I’ve received the following:
- multiple offers to speak at an event
- multiple requests to help with a plugin review
- multiple complaints that blocking their ‘company’ account on twitter was unethical of me
- requests for help from friends
That last one I don’t mind. It’s pretty rare, and it’s from people who are, you know, friends. They’re also incredibly respectful of my time (as I try to be of theirs) and understand when I say no. Pro tip: If someone lashes out or acts up after you tell them ‘sorry, no’ they’re not actually your friend, they find you useful.

Facebook

This one cracks me up because I limit FB messages to friends only, so I get a lot of friend requests just so people can message me. I decline them. The only trend I’ve noticed there is people who met me at WordCamps (sorry, no), and people from AWP (again, no).

I actually block a lot more people from FB for snide comments than anywhere else.

Slack

90% of the ‘unsolicited’ contacts on Slack I get are people who, for some reason, instead of pressing the reply button in their email, decide to DM me.

The rest are people who have a question about plugins and even though they know about the email address, think it’ll be faster to DM me. At 8pm. On Saturday.

The contact form on my ebook site

I actually went to look at those. The last few emails are:
- Spam to pay someone to write copy for my site for ‘SEO’
- Spam for a VPN
- Someone asking ‘If I can’t use a contact form, how am I supposed to get help?’
- Spam about SEO
Dear person #3 – That’s what the support forums are for.

How Do You Contact Someone Without A Contact Form?

Generally? You don’t.

Look. There’s no form on my website because I’m not your free support. If you have a problem with a plugin I wrote, go to the plugin page on WordPress.org and ask for help. I get emailed when you do that. If you have a problem with a plugin review, press reply on your email. Shockingly? I get an email about that.

What About Work?

Oh that pesky professional thing.

First of all – use the established contact methods. WordPress plugins all have support forums. Use those. Did you get an email? Press reply to the email and either propose a different method to converse or stick to whatcha got. Sometimes email will be the only way to go, as it’s the lowest common denominator (it’s 2017 – everyone has an email since you needed one to get on Twitter or Facebook or Slack in the first place).

Next, if you know how to contact someone, unsolicited, about work things, then just do that. It’s not very complicated. You reach out, you apologize for the interruption, and you ask if I have time to talk about X. Here’s an example for you:

Sorry to bother you. I’m planning a non-WordCamp event in Dallas for 2018 and I was wondering if you or your company would be interested in sponsoring? You can find the details at http://event-example.com and my email is me@event-example.com

That works because you’re starting out being respectful of the other person’s time. You’re offering contact information, which demonstrates sincerity, and lets me know there’s a non-platform limited way to get in touch with you.

Here’s another:

Sorry about the DM, but I don’t know where to go for this. I’m having a problem with DreamPress and I can’t log in to my panel. What’s the right way to get my access back?

This is good because you’re not assuming I’m the contact, and you’re asking ‘what is right?’ If it’s me, I’ll happily tell you. Well. Not happily, because I’ll be bummed you can’t log in, but I’ll help you sort it out (BTW: The answer there is the DreamPress Support page where someone’s familiar mug can be seen).

The point here is that reaching out to someone, in an unsolicited way, requires you to begin by respecting them as a human. If you can’t do that, you’re basically sending them hate-mail.

Be sincere. Be respectful. Be polite.

And if you DM me about plugin reviews, I’ll just block you and walk away.
31 October, 2017
Find It, Write It, or Buy It?

When you need to extend WordPress, you have three main choices for how to do it. You can find the code on WordPress.org, you can write the code, or you can buy premium code.

Which is right depends more on your situation and skills than your space cash.

Find It

This is the cheapest, though it can be time consuming. Finding a good plugin or theme on WordPress.org is less a factor of the search function, and more a function of being unable to codify ‘need’ clearly. For example, if you want a slider plugin (no judgement here), there are around 2000 possibilities. Newspaper themes? You’re looking at 70 or so that may fit the bill.

Finding what you need means you must narrow your search. You have to decide what kind of sliders, or what format of newspaper, you feel is the most important. You want a slider with text overlay? That’s different than one that supports animated images. Newspaper themes don’t always have the same formatting options.

Once you find the features you want, you still have the headache of reviewing the developer and the code. Oh yes. If you’re installing plugins without looking into the developers or the code, you run a high risk of damaging your site. This isn’t a huge deal for a hobby site, but if you’re trying to make a business or a successful niche site, this can make or break you.

So. Should you rely on what you find? For the most part, yes. Provided you can vet the code, you’re going to save yourself time, effort, and money. There’s no sense in reinventing the wheel.

Write It

This is the most expensive choice. Seriously. Think about how much you get paid a year. Let’s say you make $80k. Divide by two to get $40k. Now. You’re worth about $40 an hour. So if it takes you ten hours to write a plugin or theme, that’s $400. Surprise.

So why would anyone write their own code? Basically because you cannot find what you’re looking for in a way that meets your requirements, be it security, stability, or functionality. Often you will find very close versions of what you’re looking for, but when the magic bullet is missing, it’s up to you to build it all your own. This is how forks happen, in software, by the way.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with this, but it requires time and skill you may not have. But should you do it? Yes. If you can’t find what you want, and you know you can write and support the code, this is a perfectly viable option.

Buy It

People always seem to not want to do this. And really the only reason I can understand not wanting to buy premium code is that you can’t vet the usability or security until you buy it. That makes freemium code like Yoast SEO or Monster Insights my favourite kind. You can use their free code, see how well it works and if these are people you could work with.

But when you argue that you shouldn’t have to pay for code, I gesture towards the door and ignore you. Because yes, yes you should. Remember how 10 hours of writing your own code is around $400? Plus ongoing upkeep? Okay, that plugin you want is $60 a year. That means six years of the plugin is the same cost as writing it yourself. Which is a way better deal.

Should you buy it? Yes! Absolutely yes, buy the plugins but only if you can vet the plugin shop first.

Wait… You said yes to all three!

Surprise twist ending!

Here’s the thing. Every single decision you make has a cost and repercussions. They’ll all cost you time, money, and a bit of a headache no matter what you pick. So the real answer, the one I can’t give you, is what’s worth more to you?

For me, I will use free if it exists, I’ll write my own if it doesn’t, and I’ll buy premium if they do it so well I’m just whistling dixie.

26 October, 2017