[theme-reviewers] Webmaster Tools IDs - plugin territory?

[Philip M. Hofer (Frumph)]

I spend a lot of time in the forums.  Quite a lot, not ESMI lot, but quite a lot.  So please don’t use that as a reference.

Not a single forum post I have seen that discusses the difficulty of moving from one theme to another in the perspective that was too difficult for the end user.   Most often it was ‘this plugin does not work properly in this theme’.

Please, again ... show me a ‘real issue’ that has been made on it, any at all – by any user.





From: Chip Bennett 
Sent: Tuesday, July 16, 2013 7:06 AM
To: Discussion list for WordPress theme reviewers. 
Subject: Re: [theme-reviewers] Webmaster Tools IDs - plugin territory?

Spend any amount of time in WordPress support forums - the official forums, StackExchange, wherever - and you will perhaps gain a different perspective. 

If it weren't a real issue, then content such as the following wouldn't be nearly so popular:
https://www.google.com/search?q=wordpress+things+to+do+when+switching+themes


You may disagree with the extent or severity, but user experience when switching Themes is a real issue.



On Tue, Jul 16, 2013 at 9:54 AM, Philip M. Hofer (Frumph) <philip at frumph.net> wrote:

  Do you have any facts supporting the claim of end users having a difficult time when switching themes?

  Most users who switch themes often do it within the first week of having a blog, to find one they really like, in my opinion - and haven't necessarily gotten into too much with their themes to even care.

  So, yeah .. back up what you're saying with facts please.

  A link to a post of some user anywhere that has had trouble switching themes from one to another that couldn't move over data. 




  -----Original Message----- From: Dane Morgan

  Sent: Tuesday, July 16, 2013 6:43 AM
  To: theme-reviewers at lists.wordpress.org 

  Subject: Re: [theme-reviewers] Webmaster Tools IDs - plugin territory?


  On 2013-07-16 00:22, Fränk Klein wrote:

    On Mon, 15 Jul 2013 23:54:33 -0500, Emil Uzelac <emil at uzelac.me> wrote:


      Authors that offer this as an optional feature via Theme Options
      should not be allowed to include them with their Themes! Why?

      I really don't see the reason to ban this from Themes. Recommend,
      sure, let's do that, but to say no, you cannot, is just wrong :)

      Excluding this from Themes (*in case that author does not fork*
      *into a plugin*) will "break" the Theme and that user experience we
      talked about will be a terrible one. Not to mention the author.

      So in this case it's fine to do that because that's the guideline
      but it is not if the same user decides to switch the Theme and
      loses their features. Sorry I don't buy that.

  You keep saying that removing these features from a theme will result in
  a terrible user experience, but you deny that the removal that occurs
  when users switch themes will be a terrible user experience. You can't
  have it both ways.

  If the loss is traumatic, it's traumatic and we must mitigate it by
  making sure no more users are subjected to it by prohibiting the practice.

  If it is not traumatic, then good sense and best practices demands the
  separation of content and presentation and we need to nail that down.

  But I wonder why, given that this is actually *already in* the
  guidelines (
  http://make.wordpress.org/themes/guidelines/guidelines-plugin-territory/
  ) as *must not* for all of the items on your proposed list, does this
  conversation seem to take place as though this were a new proposal and
  not already the requirement?
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