CakePHP-Wordpress-Datasource

CakePHP 2.x plugin for accessing Wordpress via XML-RPC.

Status

As of the latest commit, the datasource allows the following functions:

1. getPost($post_id, array $fields = array()) Retrieve a post
2. getPosts(array $filter = array(), array $fields = array()) Retrieve list of posts
3. newPost(array $post) Create a new post
4. editPost($post_id, array $post) Edit an existing post
5. deletePost($post_id) Delete an existing post

More functions coming soon. I plan to have all the methods in http://codex.wordpress.org/XML-RPC_WordPress_API

Todos

1. More detailed installation instructions
2. Attempted to use CakePHP's unofficial Xmlrpc Source (https://github.com/cakephp/datasources/blob/2.0/Model/Datasource/XmlrpcSource.php) by extending it
3. Create Post, Taxonomy, Comment and Users models inside the plugin
4. Add more helper functions based on http://codex.wordpress.org/XML-RPC_WordPress_API
5. Add the CRUD methods for better integration with models

Requirements

• PHP version: PHP 5.2+
• CakePHP version: Cakephp 2.x
• Wordpress 3.5+ Installation

Installation

1. Copy the plugin to your application plugins folder. Make sure the directory name is "WordpressSource"

2. Create a new datasource entry in your Config/database.php

    public $wp = array(
            'datasource' => 'WordpressSource.WordpressSource',
            'host' => 'mywordpress.com',
            'path' => '/xmlrpc.php',
            'username' => 'admin',
            'password' => '*******',
            'blog_id' => 0
    );
   

3. Add this line to the bottom of your app's Config/bootstrap.php

    CakePlugin::load('WordpressSource', array('routes' => false, 'bootstrap' => false));
   

4. Make sure XML-RPC is turned on in your Wordpress installation. This is enabled by default in versions 3.5+

5. In your controller load the datasource directly

    $this->WP = ConnectionManager::getDataSource('wp');
   

6. You now have access to the helper functions. See Examples for more details

Examples

1. Get the title of the last 5 modified blog posts that are published

    $res = $this->WP->getPosts(array(
            'post_status' => 'publish',
            'post_type' => 'post',
            'number' => 5,
            'orderby' => 'post_modified',
            'order' => 'desc',
    ), array(
            'post_title'
    ));
    debug($res);
   

Branch Strategy

Master is currently stable. Refer to status for working functionalities. When submitting PRs, please use the development branch.

API limitations

I decided to document the many limitations of the XML-RPC API with possible workarounds. I ask the community to please amend to this section any other limitations or solutions.

1. The API does not allow you to fetch a count of posts.

   • Solution 1: when the Datasource calls for a count, set the 'number' parameter in the filters to 999,999. This itself sounds like a horrible idea and performances test will need to be done.
   • Solution 2: when the Datasource calls for a count, set the 'number' parameter to a reasonable number and make multiple calls to get the total number.
   • Solution 3: submit a PR to the codebase to add this obviously useful functionality
   • Solution 4: create a Wordpress plugin that extends the XML-RPC API (http://codex.wordpress.org/XML-RPC_Extending)
   • Solution 5: use the Datasource to sync with a local database that would be more flexible using a DBOsource

2. The API does not allow you to filter by columns outside the documented columns (http://codex.wordpress.org/XML-RPC_WordPress_API/Posts#Parameters_2). Currently, all "non-registered" columns are simply ignored by the API.

   • Solution 1: once we get a response, we can filter the array. We would also have to implement a proper "count" override since the count of data coming from the API would no longer be the sane as what the datasource returns.
   • Solution 2: submit a PR to the codebase to add this obviously useful functionality
   • Solution 3: create a Wordpress plugin that extends the XML-RPC API (http://codex.wordpress.org/XML-RPC_Extending)
   • Solution 4: use the Datasource to sync with a local database that would be more flexible using a DBOsource