Hey Automattic, What’s Going on With Edit Flow?

Edit Flow is an editorial workflow plugin for WordPress created in 2009 that is actively installed on more than 10K sites. Although the author listing on the plugin’s page shows Mohammad Jangda, Daniel Bachhuber, and Scott Bressler as authors, it’s currently maintained by Automattic.

Bachhuber announced in 2013 that Automattic claimed ownership of all the plugins he worked on during his employment, including Edit Flow. The WordPress.com VIP team took over development and in some cases, uses it on client sites.

If you visit the plugin’s page today, you’ll see the following notice:

This plugin hasn’t been updated in over 2 years. It may no longer be maintained or supported and may have compatibility issues when used with more recent versions of WordPress.

According to the changelog and the Edit Flow news blog, the plugin hasn’t been updated since January 2014, when 0.8 was released. For more than a year, concerned users have created threads in the support forum questioning if the project has been abandoned.

Assume that Edit Flow has been abandoned

Abandoned?

Has Edit Flow been discontinued?

A user who goes by the name drtarnaizoltan who has used Edit Flow for more than two years even suggested a crowdfunding campaign to continue development.

We have an online magazine, and started to use this plugin almost 2 years ago. We don’t want to switch another, cause everyone in the editorial likes this one. I think we are not alone in this situation. I suggest to make a fundraising for continuation the develop of this plugin. We are able make a kickstarter page or something like that to reach our goal. What is your opinion about?

The most recent commit to the project’s GitHub page is from Bachhuber six months ago. All of the communication channels used by Edit Flow developers to inform users are dormant. It’s ironic that a company that relies on so many tools to communicate internally has failed to communicate with users of its plugin. This is a classic example where a little communication about the project’s status would go a long way.

Edit Flow is an important plugin that we use on the Tavern and as a user, I understand the frustration of not knowing what’s going on. The lack of updates, and inability to fix a critical bug I reported a year ago that conflicts with WordPress mobile apps is forcing us to consider alternatives.

I reached out to Automattic to find out whether or not Edit Flow is still an active project. Mark Armstrong, who represents Automattic provided the Tavern with the following statement:

Edit Flow is a plugin we maintain, and a number of WordPress.com VIP clients use it. We have no other updates in the works at this time.

While his statement verifies that it’s an active project, all signs point to it being an abandoned plugin for those not part of the WordPress.com VIP program.

Have you ditched Edit Flow? Let us know what alternatives you’ve discovered and or use.