{"id":374460,"date":"2026-10-02T08:57:49","date_gmt":"2026-10-02T08:57:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/what-changed\/"},"modified":"2026-10-02T08:57:39","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T08:57:39","slug":"backtrail","status":"publish","type":"plugin","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/backtrail\/","author":23572675,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"version":"1.4.0","stable_tag":"1.4.0","tested":"7.1.2","requires":"5.6","requires_php":"7.4","requires_plugins":null,"header_name":"Backtrail","header_author":"Thomas","header_description":"See what changed on your site right before it broke. Logs plugin, theme and content changes and shows a simple timeline in wp-admin.","assets_banners_color":"1d2733","last_updated":"2026-10-02 08:57:39","external_support_url":"","external_repository_url":"","donate_link":"","header_plugin_uri":"","header_author_uri":"","rating":0,"author_block_rating":0,"active_installs":0,"downloads":70,"num_ratings":0,"support_threads":0,"support_threads_resolved":0,"author_block_count":0,"sections":["description","installation","changelog"],"tags":{"1.4.0":{"tag":"1.4.0","author":"thomasbkc","date":"2026-10-02 08:57:39","revision":3724409}},"upgrade_notice":[],"ratings":[],"assets_icons":{"icon-128x128.png":{"filename":"icon-128x128.png","revision":3724407,"resolution":"128x128","location":"assets","locale":"","width":128,"height":128},"icon-256x256.png":{"filename":"icon-256x256.png","revision":3724407,"resolution":"256x256","location":"assets","locale":"","width":256,"height":256}},"assets_banners":{"banner-1544x500.png":{"filename":"banner-1544x500.png","revision":3724407,"resolution":"1544x500","location":"assets","locale":"","width":1544,"height":500},"banner-772x250.png":{"filename":"banner-772x250.png","revision":3724407,"resolution":"772x250","location":"assets","locale":"","width":772,"height":250}},"assets_blueprints":{},"all_blocks":[],"tagged_versions":["1.4.0"],"block_files":[],"assets_screenshots":[],"screenshots":[]},"plugin_section":[],"plugin_tags":[8531,2679,1522,732,8541],"plugin_category":[52,59],"plugin_contributors":[283981],"plugin_business_model":[],"class_list":["post-374460","plugin","type-plugin","status-publish","hentry","plugin_tags-activity-log","plugin_tags-debugging","plugin_tags-logging","plugin_tags-maintenance","plugin_tags-troubleshooting","plugin_category-performance","plugin_category-utilities-and-tools","plugin_contributors-thomasbkc","plugin_committers-thomasbkc"],"banners":{"banner":"https:\/\/ps.w.org\/backtrail\/assets\/banner-772x250.png?rev=3724407","banner_2x":"https:\/\/ps.w.org\/backtrail\/assets\/banner-1544x500.png?rev=3724407","banner_rtl":false,"banner_2x_rtl":false},"icons":{"svg":false,"icon":"https:\/\/ps.w.org\/backtrail\/assets\/icon-128x128.png?rev=3724407","icon_2x":"https:\/\/ps.w.org\/backtrail\/assets\/icon-256x256.png?rev=3724407","generated":false},"screenshots":[],"raw_content":"<!--section=description-->\n<p>Backtrail is not a full activity-log plugin. It's a minimal debugging tool\nthat answers one question: \"What happened right before the site broke?\"<\/p>\n\n<p>It logs:<\/p>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Plugin activation \/ deactivation \/ updates<\/li>\n<li>Theme switches, theme updates and Customizer changes<\/li>\n<li>Post\/page creation, edits, deletions and trash\/restore<\/li>\n<li>PHP fatal errors (the actual \"site broke\" moment)<\/li>\n<li>Permalink structure changes (a common, silent cause of sudden 404s)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<p>Each logged change is tagged with a rough risk level (High \/ Medium \/ Low), based on\nhow likely that type of change is to be the actual cause when something breaks.\nCode changes like plugin\/theme updates rank higher than a content edit.<\/p>\n\n<p>If a burst of changes happens in a short window, the \"Backtrail\" page in wp-admin\n(and a small indicator in the admin bar, visible everywhere) shows a warning, so an\nadmin can quickly see whether something was recently changed before starting to debug.<\/p>\n\n<p>You can also mark the exact moment something broke (\"Mark as incident\"), and the\nplugin highlights everything that happened in the hour before it. You can also\nfilter by type, search, copy a plain-text summary to paste into a support ticket,\nor export the log as CSV.<\/p>\n\n<p>If wp-admin itself becomes unreachable, the log is still readable via WP-CLI:\n    wp backtrail list.<\/p>\n\n<!--section=installation-->\n<ol>\n<li>In wp-admin, go to Plugins \u2192 Add New, search for \"Backtrail\" and click Install Now.\n(Or upload the zip via Plugins \u2192 Add New \u2192 Upload Plugin.)<\/li>\n<li>Activate the plugin.<\/li>\n<li>Go to the \"Backtrail\" menu item in wp-admin.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n<!--section=changelog-->\n<h4>1.4.0<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Renamed from \"What Changed?\" to Backtrail. The admin page, WP-CLI command\n(<code>wp backtrail list<\/code>), text domain and all internal prefixes use the new name.<\/li>\n<li>Admin page CSS and JavaScript now load as enqueued files, and the admin bar\nhighlight uses wp_add_inline_style(), instead of inline style and script tags.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.3.3<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Fixed: several Plugin Check warnings in the database class were not actually\nbeing suppressed, because stacking multiple phpcs:ignore comments above a\nmulti-line statement only protects the single line immediately below the\nlast comment, not the whole statement. Every flagged query is now on one\nphysical line with a single combined ignore comment directly on it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.3.2<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Fixed: missing \"License\" plugin header, and removed a placeholder Plugin URI\n(found by the wordpress.org Plugin Check tool).<\/li>\n<li>Fixed: CSV export now correctly respects an active type\/search filter (it was\npreviously reading the filter from the wrong request source, so exporting\nwhile filtered silently exported everything).<\/li>\n<li>Cleaned up: read-only filter\/pagination parameters are now read from a single\nplace instead of twice, with each direct database query and file operation\ndocumented and annotated for Plugin Check.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.3.1<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Fixed: the admin page timeline now uses the site's own Date Format and Time Format\nsettings (Settings -&gt; General) instead of a hardcoded 24-hour time, so e.g. a site\nconfigured for 12-hour time shows AM\/PM correctly.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.3.0<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Added: logging when a post\/page is moved to or restored from trash (previously only\npermanent deletion was logged).<\/li>\n<li>Added: logging of permalink structure changes, a common silent cause of sudden 404s.<\/li>\n<li>Added: pagination (Newer\/Older) on the timeline instead of a hard 200-row cutoff.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.2.0<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Added: WP-CLI support (<code>wp what-changed list<\/code>, now <code>wp backtrail list<\/code>), so the log is readable even if\nwp-admin itself won't load. Supports --limit, --type and --format (table\/csv\/json\/count).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.1.0<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>Added: PHP fatal error logging.<\/li>\n<li>Added: \"Mark as incident\" button that highlights the hour of changes leading up to it.<\/li>\n<li>Added: filter by type (Plugins \/ Theme \/ Content \/ Errors) and text search.<\/li>\n<li>Added: CSV export.<\/li>\n<li>Added: \"Copy summary\" button (plain-text list of the visible entries).<\/li>\n<li>Added: admin bar indicator, visible on every wp-admin screen.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n<h4>1.0.0<\/h4>\n\n<ul>\n<li>First release: plugin, theme and content logging, timeline, alert banner and risk levels.<\/li>\n<\/ul>","raw_excerpt":"See what changed on your site right before it broke.","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin\/374460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/plugin"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374460"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wporg\/v1\/users\/thomasbkc"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"plugin_section","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin_section?post=374460"},{"taxonomy":"plugin_tags","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin_tags?post=374460"},{"taxonomy":"plugin_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin_category?post=374460"},{"taxonomy":"plugin_contributors","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin_contributors?post=374460"},{"taxonomy":"plugin_business_model","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.org\/plugins\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/plugin_business_model?post=374460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}