Subscriber Search - Unable to Search for WordPress.com Subscribers if Site has a Large Number of Subscribers

[masperber]

Quick summary

If a WordPress.com site has a large number of subscribers, there are some issues with Calypso subscriber search.

In #81775 (fixing issue #81676 ), the dropdown option "All" was removed from Subscriber Search for sites with more than 30k subscribers. Now, on sites with more than 30k subscribers, when the user lands on the subscribers page, the search box does not seem to work at all unless the user first manually selects "Via Email" or "Via WordPress.com" from the dropdown menu. Until a selection has been made, all searches will return no results.

Additionally, searches for WordPress.com subscribers do not work at all unless after entering the WordPress.com username or email into the search box, the user then selects the page number where the subscriber would have appeared if there were no search term entered at all.

Searches for subscribers via email seem to work fine as long as the user first selects "Via Email" from the search dropdown menu.

Steps to reproduce

1. Make or obtain a test site with over 30k subscribers (I have one available)
2. Wait for the site to sync so that the "All" option is removed from the search dropdown menu.
3. Go to Users > Subscribers
4. Without touching the search dropdown box, enter the email address of a known subscriber into the search box. Note that the subscriber will not be returned in the search.
5. Use the search dropdown to select Via Email, then enter the same email address into the search box. Note that the subscriber is returned in the search.
6. Ensure that more than 10 subscribers are Via WordPress.com
7. Use the search dropdown to select Via WordPress.com
8. Find a WordPress.com subscriber from page 2 or beyond in the subscriber list, and remember which page they were on.
9. Enter the chosen WordPress.com subscriber's username or email address into the search box. Note that the WordPress.com subscriber is not returned in the search.
10. Click on the page number where you found the WordPress.com subscriber earlier, and they should suddenly be returned by the active search.

What you expected to happen

Search should work immediately upon landing on Users > Subscribers without having to use the dropdown box. That is, either the "All" option should be returned, or if the "All" option isn't there, then one of the other options should be selected by default without having to manually select it.

WordPress.com subscribers should be found in a search for WordPress.com subscribers without having to select the page where they would have appeared in the full list of WordPress.com subscribers.

What actually happened

If the site has over 30k subscribers, search does not work unless first selecting a dropdown menu option.

WordPress.com subscriber search does not fetch WordPress.com subscribers beyond page 1.

Impact

All

Available workarounds?

No but the platform is still usable

Platform (Simple and/or Atomic)

Atomic

Logs or notes

Tested and reproduced on Atomic, not tested on Simple.

[masperber]

I want to add that it's indeterminate whether the issue with WordPress.com subscribers not appearing in search results has anything to do with the site having over 30k subscribers. This part of the bug might be affecting all WordPress.com sites with more than 10 WordPress.com subscribers.

[masperber]

Customer requests followup when resolved: 7279289-zen

[github-actions[bot]]

Support References

This comment is automatically generated. Please do not edit it.

• [ ] 7279289-zen
• [ ] 7128156-zen
• [ ] 7368574-zen
• [ ] 7712588-zen
• [ ] 7612041-zen
• [ ] 7862122-zen
• [ ] pdDOJh-2RW-p2#comment-2226

[mgozdis]

Additional report here (40k+ email only subscribers): 7128156-zd-a8c Which is also related to this bug with downloading subscribers: https://github.com/Automattic/wp-calypso/issues/83919

[maciejpilarski]

📌 REPRODUCTION RESULTS
 Tested on Atomic – Replicated

📌 FINDINGS/SCREENSHOTS/VIDEO I was able to replicate the issue on both affected sites. Below is an example for a user search for a*@****y.org: User email is visible on page 3, but not visible in the search:

📌 ACTIONS

• Triaged

[jp-imagines]

Came across this in 7368574-zd-a8c, though the subscriber count on the affected site is much lower (under 4k).

One interesting quirk: it seems the pagination might be the culprit here. If I search for a subscriber listed on page 2, no results are shown, but the full pagination controls are still present. If I then move to page 2, that single subscriber is shown. Going by direct URL (i.e. wordpress.com/subscribers/BLOG-URL?page=N&subscriber=SUBSCRIBER%40EMAIL.COM) shows a result briefly, and then it reverts back to page 1 (no results) immediately; only navigating with the pagination buttons allows the result to appear and remain visible.

Video example in p1701356316963529/1701099301.568279-slack-C03TY6J1A

Also noting that it should be possible to find which page a subscriber is on in Calypso by downloading the subscriber list CSV. The CSV lists subscribers in the same order, so once you find the affected email in the CSV list, you can calculate which page they're listed on in Calypso (Calypso_page = (csv_row + 10) / 10, rounded down).

[renata-franco]

Another one here: 7712588-zen.

[staproehl]

Another one: 7612041-zen

[mgozdis]

Another report here with 3.8k subscribers: 7862122-zd-a8c

Email-only subscriber they wanted to remove was receiving new post notifications, despite only being subscribed to comments for a single post they commented on years ago. Seems to be another bug that I am not sure is reported.

[yansern]

Sites with large number of subscribers are forced to only see list of Email Subscribers or list of WPCOM Subscribers, not both at the same time. This was implemented some time around end of December 2023. Context: pdDOJh-2RW-p2

[candy02058912]

This issue can still be reproduced. Since Calypso and Jetpack Cloud use the same subscribers component, it's reproduced on both sides. Asked more about it here: p1720772754171899-slack-C029GN3KD

[lsl]

Needs shaping, specifically: pdDOJh-2RW-p2#comment-2226

[donnapep]

@Automattic/apex I'm trying to find a home for this project that requires shaping. Would your team be an appropriate fit?