Disabling wc-admin: Repurpose filter to remove optional features

[psealock]

The previous attempt to remove the woocommerce_admin_disabled revealed some great feedback about why it was being used in #6568.

This pull requests attempts to honour those use cases by turning off optional features of wc-admin which, as of now, are Navigation and Analytics. By turning off Analytics, this removes Reports, associated API's, data stores, and order processing. This allows WooCommerce to continue being a lean CMS delivering only content without including extensive reporting.

Detailed test instructions:

1. Make sure all optional features are turned on via the UI WooCommerce > Settings > Advanced > Features

2. Add add_filter( 'woocommerce_admin_disabled', '__return_true' ); to an external plugin.
3. Go to WooCommerce and confirm Analytics and Navigation aren't available.
4. Optionally, make a request to /wp-json/wc-admin/features and confirm those features are excluded.

[louwie17]

This tested well and changes look good, just wondering about one thing:

When we set the add_filter( 'woocommerce_admin_disabled', '__return_true' ); filter, should we also filter out the navigation & analytics feature options within WooCommerce > Settings > Advanced > Features?
It feels weird to still be able to toggle them, although it won't change anything because of the woocommerce_admin_disabled being enabled.

[psealock]

It feels weird to still be able to toggle them, although it won't change anything because of the woocommerce_admin_disabled being enabled.

I thought about this and agree with this. Even if the merchant toggles, it won't have an effect. What if we disable the toggle and display some sort of message to that effect? That could prevent some confusion, I will work on this today.

[psealock]

8f58e01 changes the feature option section to reflect disabled WC Admin. What do you think @louwie17 ?

[louwie17]

8f58e01 changes the feature option section to reflect disabled WC Admin. What do you think @louwie17 ?

Hey @psealock I think this looks great, I like the WooCommerce features have been disabled. note.
I just have one small suggestion, could we either hide or disable the Save changes button?

[louwie17]

This changelog is already present and can be removed, same goes for the change on line 100.

[psealock]

Good suggestion, I wasn't sure that was possible but you can.

In d709f8c I directly edit the $GLOBALS array to remove the save button when features are disabled. See the check in core here. Something feels dirty about this approach. @joshuatf Do you know if there is a more WP or better way to do this?

if ( $features_disabled ) {
	$GLOBALS['hide_save_button'] = true;
}

[joshuatf]

@joshuatf Do you know if there is a more WP or better way to do this?

It would be great if there was a filter here, but I don't believe there is and AFAIK core does this the same way so I think it's the best available solution 👍

[louwie17]

LGTM 😄 I appreciate the extra changes @psealock, it looks and tests great 🚀

$GLOBALS['hide_save_button'] = true; indeed feels a bit strange, but it sounds like we got Josh's approval 👍 (I double checked if the save button was still present on other pages, just incase 🤣 )

[bighippo999]

Hi Guys,

Question, in the first screenshot there's an option 'Adds the new WooCommerce Navigation experience to the dashboard'. Is this the homepage, homepage menu item, inbox and the breadcrumb bar? If so why was this option dropped? and will it be brought back?

We have no use for these on our stores and until today the Disable WooCommerce Bloat Plugin hid it all away and let us get straight into the orders screen. I've now got a bunch of angry people still clicking WooCommerce to refresh the orders screen and landing on the homepage. May not seem like much but it's all time that adds up.

Cheers,

[joshuatf]

Hi @bighippo999 - the experimental navigation is not the same as the homepage or breadcrumb bar. I'm not sure there ever was an option to disable those features individually; only the woocommerce_admin_disabled filter to disable all workings in WooCommerce Admin.

Because much of the code in this repo is being used by WooCommerce core (e.g., onboarding experience) blindly turning off all the code from this package could result in problems.

If you have individual features you'd like to see behind feature toggles, please do open a new issue with the features you'd like to be able to toggle and we can look into putting them behind feature flags where possible.

[bighippo999]

Thanks for the reply @joshuatf. Not the answer I was hoping for but it's an answer :)
Sadly it's only today after upgrading and being hit with the homepage/breadcrumb again and searching for info that I found this change and the RFC that's closed for comments.
The most general feedback I'd have given is that the new admin slowed our websites, I believe due to the new analytics as others have said but no real way of knowing or proving this. For us the homepage, inbox, analytics, marketing and even the onboarding aren't used or needed. While as your put it blindy turning off all the new admin wasn't the best solution it was the only option of all or nothing when WC Admin was first added to core.

Today I've been trying to find info on what exactly the woocommerce_admin_disabled does affect. This would help to be able to list features I'd like to see behind feature toggles. Sadly it's a battle of getting through lots of info on just applying the filter to disable the new admin with very little detail of all that it affects. So I'm at a loss of building a list beyond homepage and breadcrumb bar that's the most prominent/visible for us today but I think generally I'd like to see all features have an option so that those like us who don't need/use them can turn them off without relying on 3rd party plugins to disable bits of core that may have a larger affect.

I will continue to try to find more info and build a list for features toggles I'd like to see.
Again thanks for taking the time to reply.