Jetpack Post by Email feature: numeric-only tags are not processed correctly

[alinclamba]

Impacted plugin

Jetpack

Quick summary

Numeric-only tags (e.g., [tags 3322]) are not processed correctly in the Post by Email feature. Alphanumeric tags (e.g., [tags pp3322]) work as expected.

Steps to reproduce

1. Enable the Post by Email feature
2. Compose an email and include a numeric tag (e.g., [tags 3322]).
3. Send the email to be published.
4. Check the post once published and see that the tag is not displayed
5. Compose another email
6. Add an alphanumeric tag this time (e.g., [tags pp3322]) and send it.
7. Check the post published and see that the tag was correctly processed and displayed

A clear and concise description of what you expected to happen.

Issue was reported by a user in the forum, here: https://wordpress.org/support/topic/jetpack-post-by-email-tag-shortcode/ but I was able to replicate this on my test site.

What actually happened

No response

Impact

Some (< 50%)

Available workarounds?

No but the platform is still usable

If the above answer is "Yes...", outline the workaround.

No response

Platform (Simple and/or Atomic)

No response

Logs or notes

No response

[github-actions[bot]]

OpenAI suggested the following labels for this issue:

• [Feature Group] Content Management: The issue relates to managing content through the Post by Email feature of the Jetpack plugin.
• [Feature] Post By Email: This label is directly related to the specific feature of Jetpack that is experiencing the issue.
• [Feature] Jetpack: Since the issue occurs within the Jetpack plugin itself, this label is appropriate.

[Robertght]

📌 REPRODUCTION RESULTS

• Tested on Simple – Could Not Replicate
• Tested on Atomic – Uncertain
• Replicable outside of Dotcom – Yes

📌 FINDINGS/SCREENSHOTS/VIDEO

• Weirdly, the post had the numeric tag if I included more than one numeric tag and some non-numeric ones.
• On Simple sites, the numeric tags are displayed in the post settings correctly

📌 ACTIONS

• Triaged

[kraftbj]

This is due to this: https://github.com/Automattic/jetpack/blob/9e3ae2f2e3140f60ae88df608bc1cbc34d275109/projects/plugins/jetpack/json-endpoints/class.wpcom-json-api-update-post-endpoint.php#L409

The PBE processor takes the tags in the shortcode and passes them to the v1 WP.com new post endpoint, which accepts tag names or tags ID. If it is numeric only, it assume it is a term ID.

We'd need to either change PBE to take a numeric tag and look up the corresponding term ID, using that instead, when passing it to the API or something with the endpoint.

[github-actions[bot]]

This issue has been marked as stale. This happened because:

• It has been inactive for the past 6 months.
• It hasn’t been labeled `[Pri] BLOCKER`, `[Pri] High`, `[Type] Feature Request`, `[Type] Enhancement`, `[Type] Janitorial`, `Good For Community`, `[Type] Good First Bug`, etc.

No further action is needed. But it's worth checking if this ticket has clear reproduction steps and it is still reproducible. Feel free to close this issue if you think it's not valid anymore — if you do, please add a brief explanation.