Free forever but you cannot update
tl;dr: Stackable’s 3.1.5 update throws up a modal dialog preventing update (!); temporarily disable javascript to stop that happening and permit the update to go through
Trying to update Stackable, a plugin I installed to get an expanding box of links (and then had a problem with), gives me an unusual response:
New Version Available
“There is a new version of Stackable – Gutenberg Blocks available. Buy a license now to access version 3.1.5 security & feature updates, and support.”
this happens on attempting to check the update box! Other folks are having this issue too.
In my view, breaking update workflow with a modal dialog which unchecks the update — a security update! — is a pretty big sin.
Workaround
Since it was a dialog that was probably being created by jQuery or similar I tried disabling javascript. That seemed to do the job:
Updating Plugin Stackable - Gutenberg Blocks (1/1) Downloading update from https://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/stackable-ultimate-gutenberg-blocks.3.1.5.zip… Unpacking the update… Installing the latest version… Removing the old version of the plugin… Plugin updated successfully.