Subscribe2 plugin blocks BPS Pro upgrade notification

[JB]

Hi Admin,

some news of the reason why i can´t update BPS-Pro with WordPress. Since (a few minutes) i deactivated the “Subscribe2” Plugin for some testing and voila – the plugins page shows that there is an update for BPS-Pro! Now i know that Subscribe2 is the blocker for BPS-Pro-Updates but how to solve this problem? Can you help?

Greet nukleuz

[AITpro Admin]

I will download and test the Subscribe2 plugin to see if it has any code that blocks communication with the AITpro API server.  I suspect that just by deactivating and activating any plugin installed on your site you would see a BPS Pro upgrade is available.  Basically you are refreshing or clearing transient cache.

[AITpro Admin]

I have tested the Subscribe2 plugin and it does not block communication to the AITpro.com API server.  I think in the future all you need to do is refresh your Browser on the WordPress Plugins page 2-3 times or use the BPS Pro Manual Upgrade Check link, but maybe you have some sort of transient plugin cache issue going on on your website where by deactivating any plugin your site clears transient plugin cache.  So since whatever is occurring is happening on your website then nothing could be added to the API server to change that.  The way the upgrade check works is your website contacts the AITpro API server to check if any BPS Pro upgrades are available.  Then the WordPress Plugins page has its own built-in display mechanism to either display a plugin upgrade as being available or not.  It might be possible to do some sort of alternative method for BPS Pro upgrade available checks, but I think that would require 6 months to a year of coding work to build a new interface instead of using the WordPress Plugins Page interface so that would probably not be done.

You can install BPS Pro upgrades from within your WP Dashboard just like any other plugin update using the update now link on the WordPress Plugins page. If you do not see an upgrade notice for the BulletProof Security Pro plugin then click the BulletProof Security Pro Manual Upgrade Check link on the WordPress Plugins page and run the Plugin Update Check Pro-Tool, go to your WordPress Plugins page and refresh your Browser. If you still do not see the update now link to install the new BulletProof Security Pro version then Refresh your Browser again on the WordPress Plugins page, if you still do not see the new BPS Pro version then clear your Browser cache and Refresh your Browser again. If you still do not see the new BPS Pro version then your Web Host or another plugin that you have installed is blocking the AITpro API Server: 173.201.92.1. You can use the Alternative upgrade method below.

[JB]

OK thanks a lot for testing the plugin – a few days only due the new server is running – i hope some problems/restrictions will solve itselfs 😉

[AITpro Admin]

I would not call it a problem or a restriction overall or in general.  I think in your specific case it is going to fall under “additional procedural steps required” for your particular website/server.  Since the BPS Pro automated upgrade systems – client-side and server-side communication and interface work consistently in general without any issues then it may be possible to add some additional “forced” checking that does multiple refreshes on the WordPress Plugins page, but I believe since the BPS Pro Manual Upgrade Check link is available on the WordPress Plugins page then this is the best approach to forcing a plugin upgrade check in your particular case.

[AITpro Admin]

Actually you were correct.  The Subscribe2 plugin is trying to connect to our API server to check for a Subscribe2 plugin update/upgrade.  Oops someone screwed up royally over at Subscribe2.  😉  Since the Subscribe2 plugin is trying to check for a plugin update/upgrade from our API server and obviously only the BPS Pro plugin exists on our API Server and not the Subscribe2 plugin then that update/upgrade check is being rejected/blocked by our API server and this also means that since Subscribe2 has hijacked the BPS Pro API server update/upgrade check then a check for a BPS Pro plugin update/upgrade is being broken.

Do you have a paid/premium version of Subscribe2?  I tested the free version, but assume the premium version has an API server check and for this type of problem to be occurring the Subscribe2 API server checking code is not defining its API server URI/URL and is hijacking all API server connections.

[JB]

We use the free version of subscribe2. Du you think we have to upgrade to premium?

Or what could we do now?

[AITpro Admin]

Ok I will check the free version again.  Something very strange is happening with that plugin.

[JB]

Thanks!!! 😉

[AITpro Admin]

After closer inspection what is happening is the Subscribe2 plugin is somehow replacing the serialized data for the BPS Pro plugin with its own plugin data.  I spent quite a while looking at the Subscribe2 plugin code and cannot isolate exactly which code is the root cause of the problem.  There are around 50 possible things in the code that could be causing the problem, but they are all intewoven throughout this plugin’s code so it is difficult to isolate the exact root source of the problem.  I am not sure what the best way to handle this problem is.  Will have to revisit this another day.

[JB]

I hope you find a solution 😉 THX for all!

[AITpro Admin]

Ok I had some spare time to revisit this and actually I had already originally found the problem within 20 minutes.  Unfortunately, W3 Total Cache was installed on that testing website and I forgot to clear the W3TC page cache so in other words, the very first thing I found and tested did not do anything because W3TC was caching old plugin data.  Or in other words, W3TC negated all my troubleshooting and testing so I was going around in circles without any clue that everything I tried was having absolutely no effect.  Yes, very irritating.

Cause and Description of the Subscribe2 plugin code problem:

The problem file: /subscribe2/readygraph-extension.php
The problem code: $plugin_slug = basename(dirname(__FILE__));

At the very top of the readygraph-extension.php file the $plugin_slug variable is sitting in no man’s land. This variable value literally replaces ALL plugins $plugin_slug value and not only the BPS Pro plugin’s $plugin_slug value because this variable is not valid in this file or is being used incorrectly. I believe the only valid place this variable should be used is in this plugin’s actual base plugin file, which would be the subscribe2.php file (makes logical sense anyway). The value returned is subscribe2 and not readygraph-extension since the basename dirname would be the same, but that subscribe2 value is being applied to every single installed plugin’s $plugin_slug variable value.  Or in other words, instead of BPS Pro’s $plugin_slug variable value being bulletproof-security it is subscribe2 so the code usage is obviously invalid and broken.

Solution:
For now you will need to manually comment out the problem code in this Subscribe2 plugin file: /subscribe2/readygraph-extension.php by using 2 forward slashes as shown below. I will post a link to this forum topic in the Subscribe2 plugin’s support forum on wordpress.org so that they can fix this permanently in a future version release of the Subscribe2 plugin.

//$plugin_slug = basename(dirname(__FILE__));

[JB]

Thanks for searching the code in Subscribe2. I will give it a try in a few hours and give an answer!!!

Thanks!!!!!!!

[JB]

It Worx! Very good job!
So i have to hope that the developer of Subscribe2 will fix it.

Thank you very much!

[Author]

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