Mister Bump UK

Notifications (WordPress has stopped supporting Firefox)

Do any of you use the Notifications panel on the WordPress web site?

I load the site on a traditional Windows PC, I run up my browser (Firefox) and load the site from there. Until yesterday, I could use the Notifications panel to see new posts and comments.

It looks like, in the last 24 hours, WordPress have made a change such that, on Firefox, this panel no longer loads. If you look at it through a debugger, as I did, the panel runs off to the server to load the list of notifications. Except now, it doesn’t. So you end up looking at a perpetual spinner.

I have a copy of the Chrome browser installed – I don’t use it day-to-day, but keep it for testing things like this. So, I checked the site in Chrome – the panel not only works, but has been enhanced, so it looks like whatever change they made to enhance the Chrome experience has plain broken it in Firefox.

I hardly ever use Chrome – I don’t like Google anyway, and their vision/speech-related extensions, which come bundled as part of Firefox, are very expensive. I’m not going to change my browser. Which unfortunately means I won’t know when any of you have posted, answered my comments on your posts, or even been kind enough to leave comments on my posts. Until WordPress do something about this.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, WordPress deny all knowledge of this, they say it must be Firefox’s fault. Despite the fact that I can *see* WordPress’s obvious changes when I load their site in Chrome. Can anyone smell anything?

Kinda makes you wonder why you subscribe, doesn’t it? Certainly does me.

Addendum

I found a workaround for this. It’s not a fix. but it will allow you to read notifications (read Luisa’s comment below).

First off, I’m assuming you’re looking at your list of posts. I made that assumption above, but I need to say that explicitly.

  1. Instead of clicking the bell icon, click the “reader” icon. It’s in the same place, next but one. It even has the word “Reader” alongside it.
  2. The page refreshes to the reader, I’m afraid. It’s a bit fiddly to get back to the post list, but no biggie. If in doubt, ask me how.
  3. But from that “reader” page, click on the bell. You get results back.

Firefox, indeed. What a crock of shit!

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Published by Mister Bump UK

My pivotal life event was a stroke in 2016, aged just 48. Before, I designed IT systems then took a career break as a bicycle mechanic. Since, I learned to write and performed voluntary work before returning to IT for a short spell. I'm currently working full-time on my second novel, and use my blog to let my hair down. I'm divorced with a grown / flown daughter.

12 comments

  2. Same here. Notifications (under that little bell) was fine yesterday, now nothing shows up. Annoying for sure. I use Firefox too. Maybe it will resolve back to normal soon, hope so. 🙂

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  3. Unfortunately, today I noticed that the WordPress notification panel has been changed, so I can’t tell if I’ve already read the comments and replied, or if the reply has been sent.

    I hope everything goes back to how it was yesterday.

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    • Yes I can see an obvious change in their site since yesterday. It must affect you bigtime, too. I spend little time here now so I’ll survive without it. But I’m not having a web site dictate what browser I use. They’ll realise when they see their revenues drop.

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