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Streaks

How streaks work

A streak is a count of consecutive periods where you stayed active on WPFolks. Show up, take an action, keep going. Earn awards and score points along the way.

The basics

11 streak families, three cadences.

Streaks come in 11 families. Three run on a daily cadence (login, activity, commenter). Five run on a weekly cadence (active weeks, specialty, comeback, peak week, roadmap). Three run monthly (referral, WP.org publisher, academy). Each family tracks something different.

A week runs Monday to Sunday (UTC).

Weeks are ISO weeks in UTC, so every folk sees the same window regardless of timezone. The system checks each Monday around 00:30 UTC whether you were active in the week that just ended.

What counts as 'active'.

Most score-earning actions count toward at least one streak: submitting a plugin / theme / snippet / video / resource, posting in the community feed, commenting on someone's work, casting an upvote or reaction, voting on a roadmap idea, attending an event or Academy session, getting credit for a referral, taking a Folks TV note. Login alone counts only toward the daily login streak.

Each family is specific.

A vote does not count toward the commenter family. A submission does not count toward the roadmap family. Each family rewards a specific kind of engagement. The full list is below.

Counters tick up in real time.

Take an action and your dashboard rings update on the next refresh, before the cron has run. The cron writes the canonical numbers each night so the dashboard projection only shows what will land on the next tick.

Once you earn an award, it is yours.

Streak counters reset if you miss too long. But badges you earned along the way stay on your profile forever. A 4-week badge keeps after you break a 5-week streak, because you did do four.

The safety net

A free pass covers one missed period and lets your streak continue as if you never skipped. Free passes are not handed out automatically. You earn them by being active.

Earn the weekly pass by being active 4 weeks this quarter.

Be active for any 4 weeks in the current calendar quarter and you earn 1 free pass for the Active Weeks streak. The 4 weeks do not have to be consecutive. Once earned, the pass sits in your inventory until you use it. If you skip exactly one week, the pass is consumed automatically and your streak keeps going.

Earn the daily login pass by logging in 7 days this fortnight.

Log in on any 7 days in the current 14-day fortnight and you earn 1 free pass for the Daily login streak. The 7 logins do not have to be consecutive. Skip exactly one day later, the pass is consumed, the streak continues.

One pass per period. No stockpiling.

Each pass caps at 1 in inventory. You cannot save them up by being extra active. Once your pass is used, the next one is on the next period (quarter or fortnight) when you cross the earn threshold again.

Earn-progress is visible on the dashboard.

The Safety Net panel on the streaks dashboard shows live progress: "3 of 4 active weeks. 1 more to earn your free pass." So you always know how close you are. The pill turns amber while you are earning, green when the pass is ready to use, grey after the pass has fired.

A pass covers exactly one missed period.

Skip one week with a pass available, the pass fires, streak survives. Skip two weeks in a row or skip a week without a pass, and the streak breaks. The pass is a single-period cushion, not a long absence shield. The "Saved by the Pass" badge fires the first time your pass kicks in.

No free pass on the strict tracks.

The Daily activity, Daily commenter, Specialty, Roadmap, Referral, WP.org publisher, and Academy streaks are strict. Miss one period and the counter resets. The point of those tracks is rewarding genuine consistency on a specific kind of engagement, so giving them a cushion would defeat the purpose.

Streak scoring

Tier-scaled, 10 to 500 points per milestone.

Crossing an entry-tier threshold (7-day login, 4-week active streak) lands 10 points. Mid-tier crossings land 25 to 50. The long-tail crossings (1000-day login, 4-year active streak) land 200 to 500. The harder the milestone, the bigger the reward.

Uncapped, naturally bounded.

There is no per-week or per-quarter cap on streak scoring. The catalog itself is the cap. Once every tier of every family is earned, no further streak points are possible.

Separate from the other scoring buckets.

Streak points sit alongside points from submissions, wp.org work, comments, and votes. They do not replace those. Streaks reward consistency, not productivity.

Login awards

Open WPFolks every day. The lowest bar. Just visit. Earn a free pass by logging in on the threshold number of days in the current fortnight, and one missed day is forgiven.

Activity awards

Take at least one action every day. Post, vote, comment, submit, or write a note. Strict, no free pass.

Commenter awards

Leave at least one comment on another folk's work every day. Strict, no free pass. Votes and submissions do not count toward this family.

Active Weeks awards

Stay active week after week. Any activity counts. The backbone of the streak system. Earn a free pass by being active the threshold number of weeks in the current quarter, and one missed week is forgiven.

Specialty awards

Reward for HOW you stay active. Each award is for doing a SPECIFIC kind of action every week for X weeks in a row. Submitter / Poster / Commenter / Voter / All-Around Folk.

Comeback awards

Reward for coming back after a break. Streaks end. What matters is what happens after.

Peak Week awards

Reward for one big week. Not about consistency. Just one really productive seven days, measured by points earned or by variety of action types.

Roadmap awards

Vote on or comment on a roadmap idea every week. Rewards folks who help shape what WPFolks builds next.

Referral awards

Bring in at least one new folk per month who completes their profile. Rewards growing the community.

WP.org publisher awards

Publish a plugin or theme on wp.org each month. Detected automatically via wp.org sync.

Academy awards

Attend a verified Folks Academy session each month. Recorded after an admin marks attendance.

Common questions

Why so many families? Why not one big streak?

Different folks contribute in different ways. A plugin author and a community organizer both deserve recognition without one having to mimic the other. Splitting streaks by family lets each kind of consistency be tracked on its own, with its own award ladder.

What's the difference between Activity and Commenter?

Activity is the catch-all. Any countable action ticks it: submitting, posting, commenting, voting, taking notes. Commenter is specifically about commenting on another folk's work. A folk who only votes will keep their Activity streak alive but not their Commenter streak.

What's the difference between Active Weeks and Specialty?

Active Weeks rewards staying active in any way, week after week. Specialty rewards doing a specific kind of action (submit, post, comment, vote, or three-of-five for All-Around Folk) every week for many weeks. Active Weeks is the umbrella. Specialty is the deeper cut.

Do streak awards give score points?

Yes, scaled to difficulty. Entry-tier milestones land 10 points each. Mid-tier crossings land 25 to 50. The genuinely hard milestones (multi-year ladders) land 100 to 500. The points sit in a dedicated streak_milestone_earned bucket on the leaderboard, separate from submission and contribution points.

What if I take a vacation?

If you have already earned this period's free pass, one missed week (Active Weeks) or one missed day (Daily login) is automatically forgiven. To earn the pass in the first place, be active for 4 weeks in the current quarter or log in on 7 days in the current fortnight. Longer breaks reset the current counter, but every badge you earned stays on your profile and your best-ever record stays on display. A new streak after a break can earn the Comeback Folk award.

When does the cron run?

Every day around 00:30 UTC for the daily streaks. Every Monday around 00:30 UTC for the weekly streaks. Monthly and quarterly tracks evaluate on the first Monday cron after a new month or quarter starts. The dashboard rings update in real time before the cron runs, so you can see progress as soon as you take an action.

Why isn't my streak showing progress instantly?

It should. If a ring is not ticking up after you take an action, the most common cause is that the test user is an administrator. Admin accounts are excluded from streaks by default. Define WPFOLKS_STREAKS_ALLOW_ADMINS = true in wp-config.php to include admins, or test as a regular folk.

Can I turn off the milestone emails?

Yes. Settings → Notifications and toggle off "Streak award emails." Your streak still tracks. You just stop getting the email when an award lands.

How are the WP.org publisher streaks detected?

WPFolks syncs your wp.org profile periodically. When the sync detects that you have more authored plugins or themes than last sync, it logs that as a publish event for the current month. You do not need to do anything special. Connect your wp.org account in your profile settings and the rest is automatic.

How is Academy attendance recorded?

An admin verifies attendance after each Folks Academy session. The verification fires the streak event for the month the session took place in. Attend a session every month and the Academy streak climbs.