Do you update plugins? When?
Yes. We update your WordPress plugins once a week, usually on Wednesdays. (We skip updates during short holiday weeks, or when certain employees are on leave.)
Some sites - like those hosted on Pantheon or on a custom Support plan - will receive updates on Mondays or Tuesdays instead.
What if something goes wrong?
While rare, updates pose the risk of breaking default and custom functionality on your site, so we take full site backups before performing updates. Many plugins can also be easily rolled back to a previous version to 'undo' any changes.
What if there's an significant security release?
We give priority to security updates for all plugins. We subscribe to monitoring services that alert us if there is an significant security vulnerability in any plugins that are in use. If we are alerted to an urgent security release, we will run a manual update of that plugin as soon as possible to ensure your site is safe and protected.
Do you update all plugins?
There may be some exceptions to plugin updates. For example, if we know that your site will break if we update a particular plugin – either because of new code in the plugin like a feature being removed or significantly changed, or because the plugin has been customized for your site – we'll skip that specific plugin update.
If the plugin you use is subscription-based or on an expiring license, the Cornershop Support team will contact you to request that you renew the license.
Do you check my site after performing updates?
We run a visual comparison monitor on select pages of every site – always the home page, additional pages depending on your support plan level or requested monitoring – before and after all updates. This monitoring alerts us to critical errors and visual issues. If we notice an issue, we rollback the changes using a backup and create a plan forward.
Please note that this is an automated process, and it is possible that our systems do not catch every issue. We always appreciate your own weekly review of your website to ensure it's working to your expectations.
Do you apply WordPress updates?
Yes. WordPress itself is regularly updated. Just like plugin updates, we prioritize security updates for WordPress releases, so security patches are applied ASAP.
With new versions of WordPress, there can sometimes be unforeseen conflicts with plugins and themes - so when a WordPress update is released that isn’t critical for security reasons, Cornershop delays the update by one week to ensure this new version of WordPress is stable and won’t cause any issues on your site.
Do you do theme updates?
Because theme updates can dramatically impact the appearance and layout of your site, we prefer to first investigate your individual theme and website before providing an estimate for the work needed.
Cornershop will perform courtesy theme updates by request, or when the Support team is alerted to a security vulnerability with your theme version. Cornershop Support will update your theme on a staging site (if available) and do a cursory review for issues. We'll then send you a link to the staging site and request your review as well. If Cornershop or your team identifies any problems caused by the theme update, we will create an estimate of fixes for your approval.
As a rule of thumb, we recommend budgeting to update your theme once a year (~3hrs of developer time at your hourly rate) so that if you need to update your theme due to critical issues such as a security vulnerability in the future, the version jump is not as large (ex. going from version 5 to 6, as opposed to version 2 to 6) and therefore less developer time is required.
Our team will flag a recommended theme update for you in one of 2 ways depending on your maintenance plan:
Hosting and Maintenance Only customers: 90 days before your maintenance plan renewal date
Maintenance + Support clients: During your annual site audit