example-01.md

Example 01 — Basic Setup

Step-by-step guide to set up WP Content Extractor for the first time.

Scenario

You have a content API at https://api.example.com/posts that returns JSON data, and you want to automatically publish these posts to your WordPress site.

Step 1: Install the Plugin

1. Download the plugin
2. Upload to wp-content/plugins/wp-content-extractor/
3. Activate via WordPress admin

Step 2: Configure Source URL

1. Go to Settings → Content Extractor
2. Enter your source URL: https://api.example.com/posts
3. Click Save Changes

Step 3: Implement Content Parsing

Edit functions.php and implement ce_parse_and_publish_content():

function ce_parse_and_publish_content( $body ) {
    $data = json_decode( $body, true );
    $created_posts = array();
    
    if ( ! empty( $data['posts'] ) ) {
        foreach ( $data['posts'] as $post_data ) {
            $new_post = array(
                'post_title'   => wp_strip_all_tags( $post_data['title'] ),
                'post_content' => $post_data['content'],
                'post_status'  => 'publish',
                'post_author'  => 1,
            );
            
            $post_id = wp_insert_post( $new_post );
            
            if ( $post_id && ! empty( $post_data['image'] ) ) {
                ce_set_featured_image( $post_id, $post_data['image'] );
            }
            
            if ( $post_id ) {
                $created_posts[] = $post_id;
            }
        }
    }
    
    return $created_posts;
}

Step 4: Test

1. Wait for cron to run (or trigger manually)
2. Check WordPress posts to verify content was published
3. Verify featured images are attached

Step 5: Monitor

• Check WordPress debug log for any errors
• Monitor cron execution via WP-CLI: wp cron event list
• Verify posts are being created regularly

Troubleshooting

• No posts created: Check API response format matches your parsing logic
• Images not downloading: Verify image URLs are accessible
• Cron not running: Check WordPress cron is enabled