Method

Two populations, named beside every number

Every measure names one of two populations. The top 12,500 plugins means the 12,500 plugins that WordPress.org’s own popularity ordering lists first. The whole directory means every listed plugin, 67,106 at the date of Issue 1. A figure measured on one population is never mixed with a figure measured on the other, and the population appears next to the number rather than in a note.

Every number carries the window it was measured on

Windows are stated with the figure and, for every measure, in its dictionary entry: a calendar month, a single date within it, or the trailing full year as a series of full weeks. Weekly series drop a partial final week. Days excluded for a data issue are listed in the issue that they affect.

What the directory reports, and what authors declare

Active install counts are bucketed by WordPress.org, so a plugin is reported as crossing into a bucket rather than reaching an exact number. Ratings are converted from a 0 to 100 scale. The “tested up to” and “requires” fields and the tags on a plugin page are declared by the plugin author and not verified, so this report says that a plugin declares support for a version, not that it supports it. The measures built on declared fields are WordPress version adoption and PHP requirement.

Download counts include updates. A release therefore generates downloads from the existing install base, which is why download change is read beside the number of updates released rather than on its own.