PHP Fatal error: Uncaught TypeError: Illegal offset type in /buddypress/bp-activity/bp-activity-functions.php:798

[btwebdesign]

PHP Fatal error: Uncaught TypeError: Illegal offset type in /html/wordpress/wp-content/plugins/buddypress/bp-activity/bp-activity-functions.php:798

Error:
if ( isset( $bp->activity->track[ $activity_type ]->{$arg} ) ) {

return $bp->activity->track[ $activity_type ]->{$arg};

Solution (wrong set ]-brackets):
if ( isset( $bp->activity->track[ $activity_type ->{$arg}] ) ) {

return $bp->activity->track[ $activity_type ->{$arg}];

Buddpress Version 11.3.2 and several older versions

[imath]

Hi @btwebdesign

Thanks for your report, I’ll look at it asap.

[imath]

I can't reproduce using PHP 8.2, could you give me more information, like:

• what's the value of $activity_type and $arg when you get this error ?
• what's your PHP version ?

Thanks in advance.

[btwebdesign]

Hi,

these are the desired data:

[24-Oct-2023 19:53:43 UTC] function bp_activity_post_type_get_tracking_arg
[24-Oct-2023 19:53:43 UTC] activity_type:
[24-Oct-2023 19:53:43 UTC] Array
(

[0] => activity_comment
[1] => activity_update
[2] => friendship_created
[3] => created_group
[4] => joined_group
[5] => last_activity
[6] => new_avatar
[7] => new_member
[8] => updated_profile

)

[24-Oct-2023 19:53:43 UTC] arg:
[24-Oct-2023 19:53:43 UTC] post_type

PHP Version: 8.0.29

The error looks something like this:
​https://buddypress.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/7580

Many thanks and kind regards

[imath]

Hi @btwebdesign

Thanks for providing these details and the link to the ticket. In BuddyPress Core we're always using bp_activity_post_type_get_tracking_arg() with the right $activity_type argument type. I imagine this error is due to a misusage of a BuddyPress filter or of this function. In #7580 we chose to leave this as is for this reason. You can probably debug backtrace the plugin or the custom code which is responsible for this error.

[imath]

An equivalent issue was raised there ​https://buddypress.org/support/topic/lets-prepare-the-buddypress-12-0-0-next-major-release/page/3/#post-331871

I'll check again asap.

[imath]

After looking more into it. This can only happen when a plugin or some custom code is filtering the bp_has_activities() action argument and returns an array of activity actions (or types).

Here's an example of such a filter.

function my_custom_bp_activity_types( $args ) {
	$args['action'] = array( 'new_blog_post', 'new_blog_comment' );
	return $args;
}
add_filter( 'bp_after_has_activities_parse_args', 'my_custom_bp_activity_types', 1 );

Although it cannot be caused by BuddyPress itself and doesn't seem to be on us to fix this at first sight, when we look at the inline comment for the bp_has_activities() function we wrote:

 *     @type string|array|bool $action           Filters by the `type` column in the database, which is a string
 *                                               categorizing the activity item (eg, 'new_blog_post', 'created_group').
 *                                               Accepts a comma-delimited string or an array of types. Default: false.
 

Meaning we support passing an array of activity types. So we need to fix it, and we'll do!

[imath]

As this was preexisting to branch 11.0, moving this to 12.0 milestone.

Make sure the bp_blogs_new_blog_comment_query_backpat() doesn't generate an error when an array of activity actions is requested by the activity loop.

Trac ticket: ​https://buddypress.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/9010

[imath]

In 13642:

Make Activity loop reliable when post & activity comments are synced

As the $action key of the bp_has_activities() function arguments array accepts a string, a boolean as well as an array, we need to make sure the bp_blogs_new_blog_comment_query_backpat() function doesn't trigger an error when an array of activity type is passed.

Props btwebdesign, magland, teeboy4real

Fixes #9010
Closes ​https://github.com/buddypress/buddypress/pull/190