Journal ·
How licensing and updates work
Where the key lives, how a site activates, and how WordPress gets plugin updates.
LocaleReady licenses are subscriptions. Stripe is the source of record. After payment we create a license row, email the raw key, and keep an encrypted copy so the account page can show it again.
Nothing about that is a WordPress user. The plugin talks to our licensing API when you activate on a site.
Activate
Activation sends the key, the plugin slug (localeeasy), the site URL, and a site fingerprint. A valid key is marked active for that site.
The API refuses the key when any of these is true:
- It does not exist, or it belongs to a different CloudCatch plugin.
- The license is inactive — refunded, revoked, or rotated.
- The site would exceed the activation limit on the plan you bought (1, 3, or 10 sites).
The plugin should surface those errors as invalid key, inactive, activation limit, or plugin mismatch. Do not keep retrying a rotated key.
Validate
WordPress should not hit us on every front-end request. The plugin validates on admin load and caches the result for 12–24 hours. A rotate or revoke takes effect on the next cache miss.
Updates
Plugin zips are not a public download. You get the current live file from the account page. After the license is active, WordPress update checks use the same API: only a live release is offered, and the package URL is signed. Pending uploads (from the plugin repo into CloudCatch) stay off that list until someone promotes them.
See account and billing for sign-in, download, and what happens if you lose the email.