Sometimes Dates Don't Update

Hi again, thanks for replying to my other issue. Unfortunately I still don’t think dates are displaying correctly. From your response in the other thread:

Just a note, the plugin does cache dates for 24 hours, because otherwise the plugin has to hit www.remarpro.com’s API for every plugin you have installed, each time you load the plugins page.

That makes sense, but it doesn’t seem accurate, or at least consistent, because as I previously observed above:

I simultaneously updated two plugins. This plugin displays the correct date for only one of them, and the date changed as soon as the update completed. For the other, WP.org is showing today but the plugin is showing last week.

Now, please bear with me while I set up the situation for you a little bit more…

A few months ago I left a nice review of this plugin in which I mentioned having first tried another one. That would be XGen Plugin Date Information. That plugin displays a bit more information than this one. It shows the Last Update, Last Activated, Last Deactivated, and Installation dates. I felt that there were inconsistencies with the dates being displayed with that plugin, too. Specifically, the problem I was having was:

The Install date isn’t always accurate — in some cases, it is displaying the date on which I applied an update rather than the date of actual installation. I can confirm this because the Last Update date is the day before the Install date. But in other cases the install date is correct, so I have no clue what could be causing this.

The plugin author’s reply was:

Installation date information is taken from File(s)/Folder(s) property i.e. installed date or modified date so when a file is replaced the installed date property of the respective file/folder changes.

So, then, does this plugin work the same way?

If so, that would explain why the date doesn’t match the WP.org repository, as it’s based on the date the update was applied on the site rather than the date the author updated the plugin.

But if so, then that’s not what I need. I’m looking for a way to display the official date of the last plugin update, not merely plugin activity on my site.

And if not, then could you please explain a bit more about how the plugin works and where it’s getting the last update info?

At the moment, I’ve got both plugins installed, and they’re sometimes displaying the same info, sometimes not. Here are a few examples:

1) Custom Content Shortcode:

• THIS Plugin Last Update date: Aug. 19
• OTHER Plugin Last Update date: May 31
• OTHER Plugin Installation date: Sep. 11
• WP.org Last Update date: 5 days ago

–>The Installation date is the correct Last Updated date because I updated the plugin the same day the update was released. Otherwise, the Last Update date for both plugins is wrong.

2) XGen Plugin Date Information:

• THIS Plugin Last Update date: Jun. 7
• OTHER Plugin Last Update date: May 2
• OTHER Plugin Installation date: Sep. 15
• WP.org Last Update date: Jun. 7

–>This plugin gives the correct Last Updated date since it matches WP.org. The Installation date is correct as an actual installation date for my site (but only until I apply another update…).

3) WP Core Update Cleaner:

• THIS Plugin Last Update date: Apr. 20
• OTHER Plugin Last Update date: Apr. 20
• OTHER Plugin Installation date: Apr. 29
• WP.org Last Update date: Apr. 20

–>Both plugins provide the correct Last Updated date since they both match WP.org. The Installation date is also correct as an actual installation date for my site, for now…

4) Plugin Vulnerabilities:

• THIS Plugin Last Update date: Aug. 17
• OTHER Plugin Last Update date: Jun. 1
• OTHER Plugin Installation date: Aug. 7
• WP.org Last Update date: Aug. 17

–>This plugin gives the correct Last Updated date since it matches WP.org. The Installation date entirely incorrect as both an actual installation date or a last updated date.

5) Disable Emojis:

• THIS Plugin Last Update date: May 5
• OTHER Plugin Last Update date: May 5
• OTHER Plugin Installation date: Apr. 24
• WP.org Last Update date: May 5

–>Both plugins provide the correct Last Updated date since they both match WP.org. However, even though the Installation date is also correct as an actual installation date for my site, this is inconsistent with the behaviour of the Installation date so far, which should change with updates. Strange…

Overall, I think this plugin’s Last Update date is correct more often than the other one, especially since the Installation date doesn’t work as expected (that is, as an actual installation date for the site, not to signal file changes, which is what updates are).

Of course I don’t expect you to fix the issues I’m having with the other plugin. I only installed it for testing and comparison purposes, as I really do prefer this one. But I wanted you to know what I’m seeing, because as you can tell, it’s pretty much impossible for me to figure out the correct Last Update date without having to visit the repository — which I can very well do without the use of a plugin at all.

From the above examples, only in scenario 1 does this plugin provide the incorrect date, but I use 50+ plugins, and scenario 1 occurs with several of them. I can live with the 24-hour cache thing, but I don’t think that’s what’s causing the discrepancies I’m seeing since the affected plugins weren’t updated within the last day (plus some that were are already showing the correct date).

Thanks for sticking with me through this long explanation! ?? I hope you can help me out with this…

I’ve done some major refactoring in the plugin. Including adding a settings page where you can clear the last updated column cache. Let me know if this works for you. My plugin does not keep track of when the plugin was installed. The last updated column shows you when the plugin was last updated by the author. The last upgraded column shows when you last upgraded it.

Hi Fastmover,

I updated the plugin before seeing your message, and I was coming back to tell you what a good job you did! You seem to have put a lot of work into this!

Going through my list of 50+ plugins, the Last Updated column for yours seems right all the time now — whereas the other plugin is only matching your dates about 25% of the time.

The new Upgraded column also seems to work well. I just did a site transfer a few days ago, and hadn’t noticed before that the Installed column now shows the date of the transfer for each plugin. Rather useless… But the Upgraded column appears to be showing the correct dates so far.

I’ll keep my eye on both columns and let you know if I come across any discrepancies, but this is a very promising start!

Thanks so much for your help with this! Am deleting the other plugin, which is now useless… I’m also going to update my review of this plugin ??

Awesome thank you!