Wp-calypso: New site: Can't choose a free subdomain

[davipontesblog]

There are some reports from Brazilian users in the support forum that there is no way to create a site with a free subdomain for them. This is not easy to reproduce, so, so far we have collected the following information:

Steps to reproduce

1. Starting at URL: https://wordpress.com/start/domains
2. Pick a domain name

What I expected to see

There should be a free domain option to choose from:

What happened instead

The option is not available.

Reports

@eduardozulian found out that at the domain step it seems we allow only numbers, which could be a reason why. From https://wordpress.com/typo/?subdomain=111111

The address 111111.wordpress.com cannot be registered. Sorry, site names must have letters too! But you can sign up and choose another one.

One user replied and @carinapilar found out it doesn't seem it's happening only with numbers :sweat:

Could this be related to A/B testing?

Context / Source

user-report

https://wordpress.com/br/forums/topic/achei-que-fosse-gratuito/
https://wordpress.com/br/forums/topic/nao-consigo-lancar-site
https://wordpress.com/br/forums/topic/novos-blogs/

[davipontesblog]

@niranjan-uma-shankar would this issue be better prioritized under the Martech repo?

[niranjan-uma-shankar]

It can continue to be in the Calypso repo, but I'll add it to the MarTech board. Thanks!

[niranjan-uma-shankar]

I'm able to consistently reproduce the error with the example shown in the screenshot 123134134134. I've seen an earlier report in https://github.com/Automattic/wp-calypso/issues/38878, not sure if it's related.

@Automattic/cobalt Is this something your team could look into? Please let me know if you think MarTech should own this.

For the second screenshot posted in the PR description for the pessoinhastorehome.wordpress.com, I wonder if that user has been flagged as a spam user? We've seen before that for such users, the free subdomain suggestion does not show up, reported earlier in p1601550702020300-slack-marketing.

cc @klimeryk @daledupreez

[daledupreez]

@Automattic/cobalt should definitely be involved here.

I think we have at least two possible work items here:

1. Numeric-only searches - we should show an error message or warning for that specific case (at least if we're retrieving free suggestions)
2. Better error handling for cases where a user isn't permitted to make purchases or create new sites.

[niranjan-uma-shankar]

Thanks, I'll remove it from MarTech's board then.

[lsl]

This is preventing free users from launching if they happen to make a domain search in the launch flow (search results wipe out the skip purchase option by not rendering it.)

I'm currently on rotation, and came across a couple of users with this issue, I put a draft PR up in #47663 that fixes the issue cosmetically, but needs a bit of testing / hooking up the site id props for each scenario to make the button work properly.

I don't really know enough about this and should probably be focusing on my rotation right now, would someone with more context from cobalt / martech be able to look at this?

[lsl]

Ah sorry, @daledupreez pointed out this is probably a separate issue causing similar outcomes. New ticket incoming :smile:

[daledupreez]

New issue is #47664.