[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #14179: Theme asking to update (theme with same name on WordPress.org)

[WordPress Trac]

#14179: Theme asking to update (theme with same name on WordPress.org)
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 Reporter:  design_dolphin  |       Owner:
     Type:  defect (bug)    |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal          |   Milestone:  WordPress.org
Component:  Themes          |     Version:
 Severity:  normal          |  Resolution:
 Keywords:                  |     Focuses:
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Comment (by dingdang):

 @joyously

 * Re: the new themes - adding the id as a prefix to the slug in the svn is
 all that has to be done to assure that there are no collisions and themes
 with same names in wp.org's svn and external providers will not interfere
 anymore

 * Re: The old themes are something that already happened to the WP world.
 Installations of the theme "X" from wp.org should continue to get updates
 from wp.org, the slug of "X" can't be changed. We can't do anything about
 that..

 * The addition of UID to style.css of "X"'s new versions (updates) however
 helps to resolve the side effects of the old themes with collisions to
 wp.org (counting the active installations of themes that are not related).
 After some number of updates of the theme and/or some period of time (1 or
 2 years), only active installations of "old" themes with updates and
 containing the new UID could be counted as active and to equalize with the
 "new" themes which have the UID in their slugs.

 * **NEW:** now this is something important that I forgot to mention: A
 convention for a predefined word for a UID like **"external"** should be
 adopted as an option for any themes that are not in wp.org's svn (but of
 course not mandatory). If in style.css there is just one additional line
 **"Uid: external"** then:
 - WordPress will NOT try to update the theme from wordpress.org - this
 will be the easiest way for the theme developers to prevent unwanted
 updates;
 - wp.org will NOT count these as active installs - so for example if the
 authors of the original themes which names were pointed as allowed
 exceptions with name collisions ("Total", "Consulting", etc), their active
 installs will drop to the real values and they will get down to their real
 rank.
 Then if I am an "external" author I would have the control to say "Never
 update my theme and don't count my installations on behalf of some 'smart'
 guys that caught my theme's name in the past"

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Ticket URL: <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/14179#comment:26>
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