Line breaks missing after update

Hello,

I looked into the changes in 2.8.5, but I can’t find anywhere that would cause this difference. I also tested this in a post, and the content inside [loop] are formatted.

Paragraphs and line breaks should be automatically added for post content, by the default WP filter the_content. Are the above shortcodes placed inside post content or loaded from somewhere else?

The shortcodes are right in the post content.
I’m flummoxed. The formatting is working properly on our dev site, which is about a month behind for actual content but updated for plugins and wp_content. I’ve made sure that all the plugins activated on the real site are active on the dev site, even multi-site. I turned on WP_DEBUG, reloaded the page twice, checked the debug log, found notices and warnings but no errors.
As an added glitch, TinyMCE disappeared from all the edit screens, updating to 2.8.6 brought it back. We’re up to 2.8.7 now.
I think there’s something in our site files, maybe in the theme, which doesn’t play well, but I have no clue how to find it, especially when I can’t make it happen on the dev site. I’ll have to hardcode the formatting.
Thanks for your help!

The formatting is working properly on our dev site

I see, so something must be different in the production site. Does it have the same plugin settings like modules enabled/disabled? Other than that, it could be a compatibility issue with the theme or another plugin, but if you have the same setup as the dev site, then you should see on both sides..

Do you have the same formatting issue in other pages, or content without shortcodes?

One solution might be, to use the [raw] shortcode to remove default formatting, then manually add <p> and <br> tags where you need inside the loop.

I found another page where it worked properly and found the culprit: it has to be

<div id="students">

[loop type=students taxonomy=category term=science-department-news orderby=rand count=2]

with a paragraph break space between the first div and the loop. If I go to the visual editor (I mostly work in text view) that puts the space in, and then WP puts in the <p>s. With the space the generated code is

<h3>Title</h3>
<p>
<strong>Major: </strong>
“Name of Major”
</p>
<p>
<em>Class of 201X
</p>
<p>
Content text…etc.

Without the space it’s

<h3>Title</h3>
<strong>Major: </strong>
“Name of Major
“
<em>Class of 201X
“
Content text…etc

Wierd!