[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #60992: Plugin management: AJAX plugin activation consequences

[WordPress Trac]

#60992: Plugin management: AJAX plugin activation consequences
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 Reporter:  jeherve       |       Owner:  (none)
     Type:  defect (bug)  |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal        |   Milestone:  Awaiting Review
Component:  Plugins       |     Version:  6.5
 Severity:  normal        |  Resolution:
 Keywords:                |     Focuses:
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Comment (by jeherve):

 Replying to [comment:10 justlevine]:
 > With redirect hijacking aside, **we're now left with the justifiable
 issue of guiding people to the next actionable step from the plugin
 activation screen.**

 Yes, I think it may be best to focus on that specific issue in this
 ticket. As we can see from the discussion above, we could talk about many
 different approaches to plugin onboarding / redirect hijacking / whatever
 we may want to call it. I don't think that should be the main point of
 this ticket though. The issue at hand is, **when you activate a plugin,
 you no longer have any guidance as to what to do next.**

 This is true regardless of the plugin, and whether that plugin needs
 onboarding or not.

 - If your plugin registers a CPT, the dedicated admin menu will not appear
 until you refresh.
 - If your plugin registers a settings page, that page will not be visible
 or accessible until you refresh.

 > A step up from this would be allowing users to provide an
 `activation_success_message` that could be displayed on the screen. This
 would also fill the gap caused by the lack of new links in the Admin
 Menu/Bar

 I'm afraid the current implementation will not allow us to do that, since
 even if plugin authors were to hook into a potential new filter, that code
 would not run until a page refresh.

 > A simple, non-intrusive solve that's also forward-compatible with
 whatever other reactive Admin UI updates would be changing the success
 notices to add something along the lines of 'Go to your
 <link>Dashboard</link> to see the changes'.

 I wonder if it would be possible to have 2 different post-activation
 behaviors based on the plugin's details:

 - If the plugin has a declared dependency, keep the behavior introduced in
 WordPress 6.5 ; site owners remain on the Plugin install screen and
 install other plugins.
 - If the plugin does not declare dependency, redirect site owners to the
 Plugins screen like we did in WordPress 6.4 and earlier. This option would
 offer a similar result to your proposal, except site owners would not have
 to read and click to be redirected and thus refresh the screen.

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Ticket URL: <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/60992#comment:12>
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