[wp-meta] [Making WordPress.org] #7477: Introduce limits for readme field length

[Making WordPress.org]

#7477: Introduce limits for readme field length
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 Reporter:  dd32              |       Owner:  (none)
     Type:  defect (bug)      |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal            |   Milestone:
Component:  Plugin Directory  |  Resolution:
 Keywords:  has-patch         |
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Comment (by dd32):

 I've had a few plugin authors DM me about this, mostly with the same kind
 of underlying tone.

 Although I've requested them to make the comments public, none have done
 so yet.

 Some paraphrased issues that have been raised include:
 1. 1,500 words is too short to explain the plugin in friendly terms.
 2. Since you don't allow images, we have to use lots of text to explain
 the functionality
 3. Increasing to 3,000 would allow us to bring the readme into size by
 removing our cross-promotional material
 4. Changelog should be longer, we have a large team and a lot of changes
 in each release.

 To publicly respond to these:
 1. I disagree, but I hear you. I would really suggest that this isn't the
 case, plugins don't need to go extreme lengths to detail how every
 functionality of a plugin works, in the description of a plugin. This is
 perhaps a situation where the FAQ or a plugin-specific site is needed, but
 it's IMHO a bigger thing than what should be considered a "plugin
 description".
 2. Images are supported as screenshots, and Videos are (IMHO
 unfortunately) supported inline. Perhaps I would suggest looking into
 adding a plugin Blueprint for a live-demo; #7251 as another route to
 explain the plugin if this is restricting you too much.
 3. I'm questioning if this wouldn't be falling afoul of the "readme's must
 not spam" guideline already, as a description that is unrelated to the
 plugin could be considered unwanted / spam.. that could be a stretch of
 that guideline though, and would likely depend on the actual wording and
 what plugin is being references.
 4. The changelog appears to have been the main impacted field. Currently
 there's `200` plugins that have a truncated changelog, and `100` with the
 Description truncated.

 On the last note; I'm tempted to suggest that the Changelog should either
 be excluded or have a higher limit.
 When I initially ran the numbers on number of affected plugins, I was
 looking at the description section, not the changelog.

 Looking at the data for the changelog, there are some plugins with a very
 lengthy changelog on display; One such plugin has 70 pages (in print view)
 with every feature/bug fixed since 2014 - I'd suggest that's a bit much.
 It's < 1,500 words if limited to changelogs for the last year.

 > The choice of 1,500 is such that it means zero change to (literally) 99%
 of plugins, and 99.8% have less than 3,000 words.

 For reference, comparing this to the changelog (Even though 70% of plugins
 do not have a changelog):
  - 98.45% have 1,500 or less words
  - 99.35% have less than 3,000
 If we focus only on plugins that have change logs to make it a realistic
 comparison
  - 95% have less than 1,500 words
  - 98% have less than 3,000 words
  - 99% have less than 5,000 words

 > When we truncate the section should we add a link to the readme in
 source control?
 > ... [Read more](link-to-svn-readme.txt).

 Coming back to this suggestion above by Steve, this might be a reasonable
 suggestion for these cases, although the readme.txt although designed for
 human consumption, is really not a nice document to read manually.

-- 
Ticket URL: <https://meta.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/7477#comment:8>
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