jeherve
commented
6 months ago Thanks for the feedback. Do you think it would help if the message were more helpful, maybe included a link to the support docs? Would you suggest anything else?
Open flexseth opened 7 months ago
jeherve
commented
6 months ago Thanks for the feedback. Do you think it would help if the message were more helpful, maybe included a link to the support docs? Would you suggest anything else?
flexseth
commented
6 months ago @jeherve thanks for providing feedback.
How hard would it be to get Jetpack to work out of the box in local development mode? There may be some auth/API stuff going on behind the scenes, but I've seen a lot of people complaining about Jetpack, I've used it in production and find it to be extremely useful. So many tools that you can use to prevent having to install other plugins...
... maybe making it work a little easier in local dev mode could easy the pain there?
The specific use case I'm thinking of is new developers (or existing devs from other platforms) who get a message that may deter them from using Jetpack. While testing Jetpack locally, it seems like a lot of the features work. But not all.
Personally I've been concerned about putting in time to work with it locally and I've been using WordPress for over 10 years, just trying to think of ways to onboard new developers with Jetpack.
Would it be possible to put local development mode on the roadmap for Jetpack? I really find it to be a valuable tool that does a lot of things with very little configuration, and would love to see the onboarding more easy! 😎
jeherve
commented
6 months ago How hard would it be to get Jetpack to work out of the box in local development mode? [...] While testing Jetpack locally, it seems like a lot of the features work. But not all.
When you see the "Your site URL is a known local development environment URL" message in your dashboard, it means that Jetpack's Offline Mode was automatically activated on your site. At this point, you can activate and configure any of the features that do not rely on the WordPress.com cloud. The other features, however, you won't be able to use on a site that's not publicly accessible, since they rely on data that your site cannot fetch. This is exactly why there were some features you couldn't use.
That said, and looking at your comments, I think we could potentially think of 2 improvements here:
Can you think of anything else?
flexseth
commented
6 months ago Update that message to be clearer, and update the linked support doc to better explain what Offline Mode is. The message shouldn't deter you from using Jetpack. Do you have any suggestions on that?
Just make it more clear which features work and which don't? It looks like the settings pages are turned off which I guess indicates that?
Provide some dummy data for the features that rely on the WordPress.com cloud, so you could test them locally, even if they do not display any live data.
I believe that would work. 100% with it. And a very simple set of instructions for how to use the dummy data.
If the context existed, Jetpack could be used with the Playground to do rapidly prototyping while in Offline Mode. And in general make Jetpack more approachable
jeherve
commented
6 months ago Just make it more clear which features work and which don't? It looks like the settings pages are turned off which I guess indicates that?
The features that are not available should be greyed out:
Do you think we should make some changes to that interface somehow?
flexseth
commented
6 months ago @jeherve - Would it be possible to get all of the features working offline?
In an ideal world- the best user experience would be for it to work completely in local dev environments.
Thinking of the use case about a new dev who wants to build sites quickly in a local environment.
I could look over the features and make a tracking issue to request for "offline" features?
Maybe better suited conversation for Trac? There would probably be a number of folks I'd think that would have stake in the improvements, some of which would be working on them...
Thanks for the feedback!
jeherve
commented
6 months ago Would it be possible to get all of the features working offline?
I'm afraid not. Those features were built to leverage the WordPress.com Cloud. They're designed to rely on WordPress.com instead of using storage / memory / resources from your site.
Maybe better suited conversation for Trac? There would probably be a number of folks I'd think that would have stake in the improvements, some of which would be working on them...
You're in the right place. Trac is intended for discussions about WordPress itself. For discussions about the Jetpack plugin and its features, this repository is the right place to be 👍
flexseth
commented
6 months ago thank you for taking a look at this @jeherve - I'll see how the UX is and if there could be some workarounds introduced.
If you'd like to assign me, I'm happy to work with your feedback and see what can be improved
jeherve
commented
6 months ago Don't hesitate to post your ideas here, or open a PR if you'd like ; we'll be happy to take a look!
Impacted plugin
Jetpack
Quick summary
Scary message shows up when someone is trying to use Jetpack. Let's imagine they are a new developer who likes Jetpack from WordPress.com - they've used it before.
Then, they try to install it locally and get the warning. No context.. just a message that says "This probably isn't going to work the way you want it to."
Steps to reproduce
Install Jetpack on any local development environment
A clear and concise description of what you expected to happen.
I'd expect users to be able to use Jetpack to do local development.
What actually happened
Who knows? Jetpack doesn't make the user aware of what doesn't work, what can work, just throws a scary message that would deter many from not using it.
Myself included. Am I going to spend 4 hours trying to use Jetpack and it doesn't work?
Impact
Some (< 50%)
Available workarounds?
Yes, difficult to implement
Platform (Simple and/or Atomic)
Simple
Logs or notes
No response