[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #47699: Remove redundant JSON polyfills for PHP native functionality

[WordPress Trac]

#47699: Remove redundant JSON polyfills for PHP native functionality
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 Reporter:  jrf                                  |       Owner:  (none)
     Type:  enhancement                          |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal                               |   Milestone:  5.3
Component:  General                              |     Version:  trunk
 Severity:  normal                               |  Resolution:
 Keywords:  has-patch has-unit-tests needs-      |     Focuses:  coding-
  refresh needs-dev-note                         |  standards
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Comment (by jrf):

 Replying to [comment:6 pento]:
 > The good folks at VaultPress have run some checks across the sites they
 monitor, and have found approximately 0.01% of PHP 5.6+ sites don't have
 the JSON extension available.

 🎉

 Thank you good people at VaultPress!

 This result is as I expected, but it's great to get confirmation of it.

 >
 > Giving this some more thought, I'm inclined to remove the polyfills in
 WP 5.3, except for `Services_JSON`, which is still used by plugins/themes
 (often without even checking if they need to).

 I've run some tests to see which wp.org plugins/themes we are talking
 about and it looks like it's only really plugins, with the worse offender
 being JetPack.

 * [https://wpdirectory.net/search/01DG4Q38EBEY74KZTZCWH278M5 Plugins which
 appear to include the class-json.php file] - 16 plugins with > 0 installs.
 * [https://wpdirectory.net/search/01DG4Q3NCWQ09BFSY5PTQHWZRD Themes which
 appear to include the class-json.php file] - 1 theme with 50 installs.
 * [https://wpdirectory.net/search/01DG4PXE8R7H6BD92PNMWPHJDP Plugins which
 instantiate a `new Services_JSON` instance] - 210 plugins with > 0
 installs, though it looks like this includes some false positives with the
 class being mentioned in documentation and not actually being
 instantiated, like in WordFence, where they use their own, differently
 named copy of the file/class.
 * [https://wpdirectory.net/search/01DG4PXVSEBD30655KVRWR2J1X Themes which
 instantiate a `new Services_JSON` instance] - 3 themes with > 0 installs,
 though it looks like 2 out of 3 are false positives, in that they include
 their own copy of the `Services_JSON` file which makes them independent of
 WP Core.


 >
 > We can mark `Services_JSON` as deprecated, and put up a dev note to
 remind devs that they need to check that `json_last_error()` doesn't exist
 before using it.

 👍

 >
 > For the handful of sites that don't have the JSON extension, it'd be
 good to push out a fix in WP 5.2.3 that would warn them of this. Site
 Health is part of it, but it should also block updates when WP 5.3 is
 released, with a relevant error message.


 I've just been looking at this, but I haven't been able to find any such
 existing check yet for required extensions, though I may be looking in the
 wrong place.

 If it doesn't exist yet, it would need to be added and it would be useful
 if we could re-use the list of required extensions as contained in the
 `WP_Site_Health::get_test_php_extensions()` method.

 For now, I'm going to start with refreshing the WP 5.3 patch and adding a
 separate patch for WP 5.2 Site Health.

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Ticket URL: <https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/47699#comment:7>
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