Marketplace

[Daddy]

I'm not entirely sure what's going on internally to cause the awful delays in approvals for new files and updates but something has to give. An average wait time of a week for file updates is very annoying, and since this software heavily revolves around 3rd party modifications, I don't understand why this isn't more of a priority.

[Stuart Silvester]

87% of current pending reviews were submitted either yesterday or today (i.e. in around the last 24 hours), there are three pending reviews that are taking longer than usual for various reasons.

Reviews are definitely not slow at the moment, but what you may be seeing is a developer saying their resource is pending review and then their submission being rejected. In this situation it may look like the reviews are taking longer than they really are, but we're waiting for the developer to submit a fixed version in that case, so we can review it again.

[CoffeeCake]

34 minutes ago, Stuart Silvester said:

87% of current pending reviews were submitted either yesterday or today (i.e. in around the last 24 hours), there are three pending reviews that are taking longer than usual for various reasons.

Reviews are definitely not slow at the moment, but what you may be seeing is a developer saying their resource is pending review and then their submission being rejected. In this situation it may look like the reviews are taking longer than they really are, but we're waiting for the developer to submit a fixed version in that case, so we can review it again.

It would be nice to show something along the lines of "a new version has been submitted for review" and "Developer action required" or "IPS review pending" as statuses to help end users have visibility into this process.

[Lindy]

4 hours ago, Paul E. said:

It would be nice to show something along the lines of "a new version has been submitted for review" and "Developer action required" or "IPS review pending" as statuses to help end users have visibility into this process.

We underestimated how many would not follow or are otherwise confused by the new Marketplace guidelines. We're also surprised by the number of submissions that won't install at all or won't uninstall, thus indicating an unfortunate lack of testing. So, we didn't put in place provisions to better communicate pending status updates - but we are considering it now and your proposal is a fantastic idea, thanks.

Do note, developers who do not follow the guidelines and have their submission rejected are pushed to the end of the queue unless it was a very minor error. This allows the team to more quickly process those who did in fact follow the guidelines, but does delay the rejected resource from getting to you, for which we apologize.

There will some transition pains for both sides as we have never been in the position of taking a true no non-sense approach to the Marketplace before. It may take a bit of time to break old bad habits. 😉

[Daddy]

Was there a specific reason to disallow manual updates to marketplace apps? Not only is that creating a bottleneck, but the new update approval system is not complementing that very well. Why after all these years it's only now relevant to review updates?

I like most of the 4.5 marketplace changes but this seems rushed and not well planned out. I work with a few devs who've encountered similar issues with this miscommunication resulting in their updates taking days, not hours.

I hope it'll sort itself out, but we need to be able to update marketplace files. Having to maintain two versions just to be able to have the option to update one makes no sense to me considering how easy it is to just update the files host-level.

Edited September 11, 2020 by Deathicated

[Lindy]

4 hours ago, Deathicated said:

Was there a specific reason to disallow manual updates to marketplace apps? Not only is that creating a bottleneck, but the new update approval system is not complementing that very well. Why after all these years it's only now relevant to review updates?

I like most of the 4.5 marketplace changes but this seems rushed and not well planned out. I work with a few devs who've encountered similar issues with this miscommunication resulting in their updates taking days, not hours.

I hope it'll sort itself out, but we need to be able to update marketplace files. Having to maintain two versions just to be able to have the option to update one makes no sense to me considering how easy it is to just update the files host-level.

Yes, we had so many issues, so much support overhead and so much customer dissatisfaction with inconsistency and sloppiness prior to 4.5. We only provided cursory reviews for initial submissions and as is often the case, a new product (or resource) tends to start with a base and then future releases build upon that with enhancements. Without screening updates, we were missing some pretty significant issues that broke communities. Couple that with the disorganization of customers manually managing updates for resources, leaving their community in an unstable site with a hodge-podge of outdated third party code, we had to make a decision. Either limit the damage a third party resource could do to a community, which would mean removing some of the flexibility that makes resources so useful -- or exerting control over what's pushed through the Marketplace. We opted for the latter as it ultimately benefits the majority. The majority of contributors from a support and even, to an extent, piracy standpoint. Customers because the resources have far more stringent standards, are screened - even for upgrades - which can only increase confidence and stability in the product. IPS, because the support overhead is reduced due to out of date third party resources, poorly updated resources, etc.

We recognize there have been a few bumps and I apologize for same. I have the utmost confidence and faith in this change. Regarding approvals, more information regarding the process for critical updates has been posted in the contributor forum - please be sure to follow that forum if you don't already. In short, there's a provision for critical updates. Normal updates should be expected to take 24-48 hours or so, which is typical of an app store based on my research.

 

[Square Wheels]

Another suggestion for the ACP Marketplace, please have the error message that pops us when trying to upgrade be more specific when it's time to renew.  I tried to upgrade an app and see this when I click Install Upgrade, then I click Agree & Proceed:

 

Then I need to leave my ACP, come here, pay the renewal fee, leave here, go back to my ACP and try again.

Could be a little smoother.  🙂

[Daddy]

@Lindy I understand the quality assurance portion, but can't there be an option to manually update with a warning message letting the user know their site can have unexpected behavior if they install updates outside the marketplace?

[Stuart Silvester]

1 hour ago, Square Wheels said:

Another suggestion for the ACP Marketplace, please have the error message that pops us when trying to upgrade be more specific when it's time to renew.  I tried to upgrade an app and see this when I click Install Upgrade, then I click Agree & Proceed:

 

Then I need to leave my ACP, come here, pay the renewal fee, leave here, go back to my ACP and try again.

Could be a little smoother.  🙂

I have this on my list of things to improve 👍