Network Admin Email description doesn't really explain what it is.

[Ipstenu]

On /wp-admin/network/settings.php the field for Network Admin Email has this as the description:

This email address will receive notifications. Registration and support emails will also come from this address.

By contrast, the per-site has this:

This address is used for admin purposes, like new user notification.

I propose we change the Network Admin one to this:

This address is used for admin purposes, like site notifications. Registration and support emails will be sent from this address.

That makes for a little more parity, and explains more clearly that emails are sent FROM this address (which has been unclear to some).

The attached patch comes in two versions.

1) As I originally proposed
2) Without the 'and support' phrase since I have no idea what we are referring to with that one.

[Ipstenu]

With 'support'

[Ipstenu]

Without 'support'

[Ipstenu]

Well this opened up a rats nest of issues.

This ticket will need to cover the following:

1) The verbiage is confusing
2) The purpose of the various email addresses are confusing

On single-site, the admin email receives notifications of new users and updates. The shadow email of wordpress@ is used to send emails to new users (password resets, etc).

On multisite, the admin email is used for both purposes for the network. It receives all emails concerning new users and sends all emails to users.

On multisite, the per-site admin email is somewhat less useful by core, but still used to send notifications to (not from).

In all cases, the language used does not fully describe the purpose of the email address being set.

We need to go over the following:

1) Single Single Admin Email

This address is used for admin purposes, like new user notification.

2) Network Admin Email

This email address will receive notifications. Registration and support emails will also come from this address.

3) Multisite per-site admin email

This address is used for admin purposes. If you change this we will send you an e-mail at your new address to confirm it. The new address will not become active until confirmed.

---

If we're going to provide examples for what 'admin purposes' are, we should do so across the board. Also we should say 'administrative' vs 'admin' since the former is more descriptive of what we're talking about.

1) Single Single Admin Email

This address will receive administrative emails, like updates and new user notifications.

2) Network Admin Email

This address will receive network administrative emails, like updates and new user notifications. Emails will be sent from this address, like to newly registered users and for password resets.

3) Multisite per-site admin email

This address will receive administrative emails. If you change this we will send you an e-mail at your new address to confirm it. The new address will not become active until confirmed.

That last one I'm not 100% sure on what emails it's actually going to get.

[SergeyBiryukov]

Previously: #23569

[jeremyfelt]

Also related, #27239.

[jeremyfelt]

In 35575:

MS: Allow "Network Admin Email" to be a non-user during network setup.

The network admin email setting for a network is often used as a catch-all or notification email separate from the actual user ID set as the owner of the new network. If a non-user email address is set during network installation, we can defer to the current user as the actual network admin and apply the entered email as the address to which general notifications are sent and emails are sent from.

In the future, we'll want to update the messaging around "Network Admin Email" to reflect its reality. See #34293.

Props jjeaton.
Fixes #34065.

[jeremyfelt]

Related: #37593

[flixos90]

Since we're getting rid of the term "Super Admin" and replace it with "Network Administrator" (see the ticket from above), the title "Network Admin Email" for this field gets somewhat confusing since this is not necessarily the email address of the network administrator (as there can be more than one) - for example there is a sentence in Core that would become Network administrator privileges cannot be removed because this user has the network admin email..

As @jeremyfelt stated in https://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/37593#comment:21, this email is rather a notification email, so I think at first glance "Network Notification Email" could be a good name, but there might still be a more appropriate one. It certainly makes sense to find a more suitable name, so let's discuss.

[vizkr]

Would it make more sense for this to be the "Network Owner Notification Email" or is that too nit picky?

[johnjamesjacoby]

I like "Network Notification Email" as a label, or even just "Network Email" if we want to keep things equally ambiguous. We could probably give sites the same treatment with a "Site Notification Email" too.

[flixos90]

@johnjamesjacoby I like the idea of using a simple term like "Network Email" and "Site Email", however in this case we need to make double-sure that the description of each of the three variants describes the usage of these email addresses precisely.

Regarding the restriction that prevents revoking super admin capabilities when that user has the same email address, anyone knows the history about that? My current thought is to get rid of this restriction as the contact / notification email should be independent of a user's email address in my opinion. This would also make the description easier to understand since it would (as far as my understanding goes) entirely be a notification address then.

[flixos90]

Related, I opened #39170 to remove the connection between the network email address and super admin users. This change would confirm that "Network Admin Email" is now an unsuitable label for the setting.

[johnjamesjacoby]

anyone knows the history about that?

It was the only way to confirm "ownership" of a site or network (similar to what we talked about at WCUS and the site owner ticket.)

[flixos90]

Replying to johnjamesjacoby:

It was the only way to confirm "ownership" of a site or network (similar to what we talked about at WCUS and the site owner ticket.)

It isn't really functional though (inconsistent), and furthermore only works for the network admin. I think we're better off removing this connection and then investigate time thinking about an actual owner role (probably for both sites and networks) to build upon the WCUS discussion.

Let's continue discussion on that in #39170 though.