WordPress Theme/Plugin updater is based on folder name rather than theme/plugin name set in file 😕

[nvartolomei]

Hello,

I just noticed updates for themes that have folder name Discovery for example, even if I change theme name in style.css I can still see updates, afaik WordPress.org used theme name before to check for updates and not folder name.

The same applies for plugin, some of our clients already did accidental updates. Now I should rename all folders that matches some on WordPress.org, why you don't check theme name too? Or theme author?

Now I can't have fancy names for folders with home made things 😕

[pento]

Hi there!

That's the expected behaviour. For themes hosted on WordPress.org, we only allow one theme per folder name, and we check for updates based on that folder name.

For themes not hosted on WordPress.org, you must choose a unique folder name - we generally recommend you name it after the site the theme is for, or perhaps prefix it with your name, or your business name.

[nvartolomei]

But if my site is discovery.md? Or make.pro? Why don't check theme author too for example? Why you even changed this behaviour, theme name wasn't good enough?

And once again, have you considered that people will make accidental updates now after you changed this behaviour?

[Otto42]

The theme name is considered, as is the "URI" for plugins. But this has been the way the update check has worked for a very long time.

If you don't want update notifications, use a unique name. The name of your site is a good one to use.

Note: An alternative is to use an uppercased directory name. We ignore those, because all our slugs are lowercase.