Meta Watch

Field values are stored under the field's key. Rename the key, delete the field, or remove a Location, and the values that were already saved stay where they were. VX never moves or deletes content while you save a fieldset, because on a big site that could mean moving millions of values in one click.

VX → Settings → Meta Watch is where that follow-up work waits for you. Its card on the Settings screen says None pending when there's nothing to do.

Moves and leftovers

Meta Watch lists two kinds of item:

• Move: values waiting to follow a renamed key. Created when you rename a key and choose Queue a move to the new key (or queue a deletion instead).
• Leftover: values no field reads any more, after you remove a field or narrow a fieldset's Locations. You can Ignore the reminder or Delete the values.

If you bring the field or Location back before acting, the values are in use again and the item disappears by itself.

Reviewing and running

Review shows how many values are affected, where they are, and samples of them. Then Move values or Delete values. Large jobs run in batches; if you leave, the move resumes when you come back.

If an entry already has a value under the new key, VX doesn't overwrite it. You choose to skip those entries (the default), which leaves their old values behind and keeps the item open, or to keep both values.

If you also changed the field's type, a sample of the values is checked first:

• Compatible: the values carry over unchanged.
• Lossy: some values would change or be emptied. You confirm before moving.
• Incompatible: the old and new types store data differently, so a move isn't offered.

Warning

Deleting values is permanent. Moves can't be undone automatically either: to reverse one, rename the key back and move the values again. Take a database backup before large changes.

Relation fields

Relation fields keep their links in their own table, identified by the Relation key, not the field key. Renaming the field key doesn't move anything and doesn't break anything. Changing the relation key does create a Move, and that move won't run until every field that shares the old relation key has been updated to the new one.

What Meta Watch doesn't track

Only changes to VX fields and Locations. It doesn't clean up values from before VX, other plugins' data, or posts left behind by a deleted post type.

Technical details for LLMs

• Queue entries are created only when values exist (counted before recording); open entries carry a live affected count and clear themselves when their values disappear. Finished or skipped reports stay until retired.
• Abilities: vx-framework/list-field-migrations, vx-framework/preview-field-migration, vx-framework/run-field-migration (disposition: migrate | delete; leftovers default to keep; conflict_policy: skip | keep_both; accept_lossy; resumable with cursor), vx-framework/dismiss-field-migration. No undo.
• Storage locations covered: post meta per post type, term meta per taxonomy, user meta.
• Hook: vxframework/field_migrations/meta_key_changed; executors via vxframework/fieldsets/migration_executors.