WPCS 3.0.0 Breaking Changes

Like many #WordPress #Plugin and Theme developers I use #PHPCS with WordPress rule sets to help with coding the WP standards, especially around security.

Also like many I use #composer to install #WP coding standards with its dependencies.

The issue is that composer will update without warning, even if there are breaking changes.

So I got this issue

ERROR: Referenced sniff "PHPCSUtils" does not exist

Which rather flummoxed me, A Google Search wasn’t much help, nor a chat with Chat GPT.

Eventually I raised an issue on GitHub and after a bit of back and forth discovered that 3.0.0 was a breaking change.

The team had been diligent and noted this on Make Core and @ipstenu@tech.lgbt had taken the effort to X-post to make.wordpress.org/plugins/ which of course I subscribe to – but still I missed it.

So just in case you missed it too I posted this.