WordPress 5.2 has a nifty new feature that may catch you by surprise. Should one of your plugins misbehave, check your email inbox. You should see a message like this: 

Howdy!
Since WordPress 5.2 there is a built-in feature that detects when a plugin or theme causes a fatal error on your site, and notifies you with this automated email.

In this case, WordPress caught an error with one of your plugins, Example Plugin.

This section of the mail will tell you the name of the plugin or theme that is causing the error.

First, visit your website (https://example.com/) and check for any visible issues. Next, visit the page where the error was caught (https://example.com/wp-admin/admin.php?page=example-plugin) and check for any visible issues.

Please contact your host for assistance with investigating this issue further.

Here you will find what file triggered the error and where to find it.

If your site appears broken and you can’t access your dashboard normally, WordPress now has a special “recovery mode”. This lets you safely login to your dashboard and investigate further.

https://example.com/wp-login.php?action=enter_recovery_mode&rm_token=gapngneiwo2n5k3huu37&rm_key=akjn7lvj3naA53EHEHjhwp3

To keep your site safe, this link will expire in 1 day. Don’t worry about that, though: a new link will be emailed to you if the error occurs again after it expires.

If the error broke your login page to the WordPress control panel, you can use the link supplied in the email to gain access again.

Error Details

=============

An error of type E_ERROR was caused in line 769 of the file /var/www/example.com/public/wp-content/plugins/example-plugin/index.php. Error message: Uncaught Error: Call to a member function get_data() on boolean in /var/www/example.com/public/wp-content/plugins/example-plugin/index.php:769

Stack trace:

#0 /var/www/example.com/public/wp-includes/class-wp-hook.php(286): example_plugin(”)

#1 /var/www/example.com/public/wp-includes/class-wp-hook.php(310): WP_Hook->apply_filters(”, Array)

#2 /var/www/example.com/public/wp-includes/plugin.php(465): WP_Hook->do_action(Array)

#3 /var/www/example.com/public/wp-admin/admin.php(253): do_action(‘make-magic…’)

#4 {main}

Thrown

This is the error logs surrounding the error, which can be very useful for your web developer to diagnose exactly what went wrong.

This email is a legitimate notification from your site and will give you a good insight into why your website failed. It not only gives you the plugin or theme name that has a problem, but also the specific file and function that caused the error. 

Forward this email to your web developer, it will be a great help in fixing the error. This also provides you with an additional way to log into your site should it become inaccessible, which will make it easy to log into the dashboard to fix the misbehaving theme or plugin.

Want to talk? Please contact us if you need any assistance, we’re always happy to help!