id	summary	reporter	owner	description	type	status	priority	milestone	component	version	severity	resolution	keywords	cc
20529	r20565 introduces get_the_author_meta() regression	johnjamesjacoby	nacin	"Plugins like BuddyPress and bbPress use get_the_author_meta() on posts in loops that may not set the $post global or might not even be a post at all. Things like shortcodes and secondary loops of posts with their own WP_Query object still need to use get_the_author_meta() and might not have user ID information available in the $authordata global.

I suggest a few sanity checks to check for object/array values, and load/reset them if they aren't around. Long term we should look into smoother ways to get possibly cached post author data directly.

BackPress, bbPress 1.x, and !WordPress pre 2.8 had functions like get_the_author_id() for convenience sake, but they were all deprecated in !WordPress 2.8 in favor of the singular author_meta function."	defect (bug)	closed	normal	3.4	Users		normal	fixed	reporter-feedback