DraftSEO.AI

Changelog

1.2.4

Fixes stuck “images importing…” jobs, adds a Logs admin tab with CSV export and DB-backed structured logging, and improves error visibility across all image import paths.

• Fixed: Blog posts published before April 5 2025 could show “images importing…” in the DraftSEO UI indefinitely if the original callback failed (e.g. the 24-hour HMAC window expired before Action Scheduler ran). Running Sync now automatically detects and resolves these stuck jobs when WordPress confirms the post exists.
• Fixed: The repair scan no longer silently discards its completion status. When it finishes importing all images for a post it now notifies DraftSEO via a new long-lived API-key endpoint, closing the loop on any syndication job whose HMAC callback URL had already expired.
• New: Posts now store the DraftSEO syndication job ID (draftseo_syndication_job_id) in post meta at publish time. This enables the repair scan to notify DraftSEO without the original (expiring) callback URL.
• New: Logs tab in the plugin settings page. Browse, filter by level/type, search, export to CSV, copy to clipboard, or clear all entries. Logs are kept for 30 days and cleaned up automatically by Action Scheduler.
• New: Structured DB logger (wp_draftseo_logs table with level, type, message, post_id columns). All image import paths — direct, async, background, repair scan, health check, and callback delivery — now write structured log entries visible in the Logs tab in addition to WordPress debug.log.
• Improved: process_images_background (hybrid strategy, 6+ images) now logs per-URL download failures and a completion summary — previously completely silent.
• Improved: import_images_direct, process_images_with_callback, import_from_temp, sequential_download_images, import_images_async, and fire_callback now each emit structured log entries with post ID, URL, and error detail on failure.

1.2.3

Critical fix: background image health check and repair scan were silently never scheduled due to Action Scheduler initialisation timing.

• Fixed: The daily image health check was never registered and the self-healing repair scan never ran after plugin install. Both background jobs silently failed to schedule because they were called before Action Scheduler’s data store was ready. Both are now hooked to the correct ‘action_scheduler_init’ event, which fires only when the data store is fully initialised and it is safe to call Action Scheduler APIs.

1.2.2

Bug fixes, new SEO plugin support, and automatic sync reconciliation.

• Fixed: Publishing the same blog twice — for example after a network timeout or a retry — no longer creates a duplicate WordPress post. The second request returns the existing post immediately.
• Fixed: The SEO title (the per-post SERP title override, separate from the post title) was never written to the active SEO plugin. When DraftSEO sends a seoTitle, it is now written to Yoast (_yoast_wpseo_title), Rank Math (rank_math_title), All in One SEO (_aioseo_title), and SEOPress (_seopress_titles_title).
• Fixed: Images imported with a caption field from DraftSEO now have their caption visible in the WordPress Media Library (Edit Media → Caption), in the block editor image block, and in default [caption] / <figcaption> output. Previously the caption was silently dropped.
• Fixed: The self-healing image repair scan was silently skipped when a user updated the plugin by deactivating and reactivating it — the most common manual update flow. The fix ensures the repair scan fires correctly after every update, not just when using WordPress’s automatic update mechanism.
• Fixed: A logic error in the duplicate-job guard could allow the repair scan to be queued more than once simultaneously. The guard now correctly detects any pending repair job regardless of its internal batch number.
• New: SEOPress is now a fully supported SEO plugin. The meta description (_seopress_titles_desc), SEO title (_seopress_titles_title), and canonical URL (_seopress_robots_canonical) are written at publish time.
• New: Posts containing YouTube videos now have VideoObject structured data (JSON-LD) added to their page head automatically. This makes the videos eligible for video-rich results in Google Search.
• New: When you click Sync for a WordPress connection, DraftSEO now automatically restores the WordPress post link for any blog whose mapping was lost (for example after a database restore). Affected blogs immediately show the correct “Published to WordPress” card in their detail view.
• New: When you click Sync, DraftSEO also automatically recovers any published posts that exist on WordPress but are missing from your DraftSEO account — for example after a data restore or account transfer. All affected blogs immediately show as Published on the Posts page.

1.2.1

Internal code reorganisation. No behaviour changes.

• Improved: Plugin PHP files split into smaller, single-responsibility classes for easier maintenance and future development.

1.2.0

Image reliability fixes, automatic self-repair for all previously affected posts, and continuous background health monitoring.

• Fixed: Images were sometimes missing from the WordPress Media Library after publishing from DraftSEO. This happened silently on certain hosting environments due to differences in how the server handles external downloads. The plugin now tries an additional download method before giving up, significantly increasing import success rates across all hosting environments.
• New: After updating, the plugin automatically scans your entire site in the background for any posts where images were never properly imported from DraftSEO. Affected posts are silently repaired without any action needed from you. You can monitor progress under Tools > Scheduled Actions in your WordPress admin.
• New: A lightweight check now runs automatically every 24 hours. If any post is found with images that didn’t fully import — for example because a server timeout interrupted the process overnight — the plugin queues a repair automatically. No monitoring required: healthy sites see no activity and affected posts are fixed without manual intervention.
• Improved: The daily check permanently skips posts that have already been fully verified, so it stays fast regardless of how many posts are on your site. On a fully audited site the check completes in a fraction of a second. Republishing a post automatically resets it so new images are always verified.
• Improved: Image imports now run in controlled parallel batches, keeping resource usage predictable on any hosting environment. Designed and tested for sites publishing large numbers of blogs, each with many images.

1.1.6

Faster republishing — only new or changed images are re-downloaded.

• Improved: When republishing a post, images that were already imported in a previous publish are no longer downloaded again. Only new or replaced images are fetched. For a typical blog, republishing with no image changes now skips all image downloads entirely.

1.1.5

Reliable image import confirmation for all publish paths.

• Fixed: Republishing a post was blocked with “not in completed status” when a previous publish had images still importing in the background. Republishing now self-heals stuck jobs and always proceeds.
• Fixed: Manual publish and Republish now use the same async callback path as Auto-publish — DraftSEO is notified when all images finish importing instead of assuming completion immediately.
• Improved: The background image callback is now confirmed (blocking HTTP request) so Action Scheduler can automatically retry delivery if DraftSEO’s server is temporarily unreachable.
• Improved: Republish is no longer blocked while images are still uploading — updating the post content always proceeds immediately, and image import completion is tracked in the background.

1.1.4

Cosmetic and connectivity improvements.

• Improved: Settings page now displays “DraftSEO.ai” with the installed plugin version shown next to the heading.
• Improved: Connection status now shows a clear “Connection Issue” state (instead of “Connected”) when authentication with DraftSEO.ai fails — includes step-by-step instructions to reconnect.
• Improved: “Go to DraftSEO.ai” button on the connected settings page is cleaner — icon removed, label updated.

1.1.3

Reliability improvements, faster image loading, and cleaner background processing.

• Fixed: Images on published posts were sometimes not appearing on low-traffic websites — they were queued to download in the background but the background job wasn’t starting until the next page visit. They now start immediately regardless of site traffic.
• Fixed: Switching the plugin off while a publish was in progress could leave background tasks running after deactivation. The plugin now cleanly stops all background jobs when it is deactivated.
• Fixed: Removing the plugin (uninstall) now properly disconnects your site from DraftSEO.AI — the connection is closed on the DraftSEO side before all plugin data is removed.
• Fixed: Plugin text was not translating correctly on WordPress sites running in a language other than English. Translation files now load properly.
• Improved: Background image jobs now use Action Scheduler instead of WP Cron. Action Scheduler runs as a true background process without requiring a page visit, retries failed jobs automatically, and shows pending and completed jobs in the WordPress admin at Tools > Scheduled Actions.
• Improved: Images in background jobs are now downloaded in parallel before being imported. For a blog with 20 images this reduces total download time from roughly 60–100 seconds (sequential) to 5–15 seconds (parallel).
• Fixed: Republishing a post was creating duplicate images in the Media Library for any image that had not changed. Only new or replaced images are now downloaded and imported — unchanged images are reused from the existing Media Library entry.

1.1.2

Security update: fixes API token authentication on WordPress sites where the Application Passwords feature or a security plugin was blocking server-to-server requests from DraftSEO.AI before they could be validated.

1.1.0

Automatic cleanup when republishing with a new image.

• When you republish a post with a new AI-generated image, the new image is swapped in automatically and the previous image is removed from your WordPress Media Library — keeps your media folder clean and saves storage space.

1.0.5

YouTube video embeds now work on WordPress.

• Fixed YouTube videos not appearing on published WordPress posts — videos are now properly converted to native WordPress embed blocks before publishing, so they show up as responsive YouTube players on your site

1.0.4

Content formatting and image fixes.

• Fixed headings appearing as raw text after images instead of being properly formatted
• Removed unwanted image captions — image descriptions were showing as visible text below every image. They are now used for accessibility only and no longer display on the page

1.0.3

Content formatting fixes.

• Fixed headings sometimes appearing as plain text instead of proper headings
• Fixed citation links being malformed in published posts

1.0.2

Citation links, external link handling, and FAQ structured data for rich results.

• In-text citations — [1], [2] markers now render as clickable superscript links that jump to the matching reference in the References section
• References section — Converted to a numbered list with anchor IDs (#ref-1, #ref-2) for smooth in-page navigation
• External links — All external links now open in a new tab with rel="noopener noreferrer"
• FAQ structured data — FAQ question-answer pairs from blog content are injected as JSON-LD into the post <head> for Google FAQ rich results
• Theme-consistent styling — CSS is injected for citations, references, and tables so they display correctly across all WordPress themes
• Active sites filter — The WordPress site dropdown now shows only connected, active sites

1.0.1

Hotfix for content rendering in published posts.

• Fixed: YouTube embeds were being stripped during publishing — they now render as embedded players on your site
• Fixed: Data tables were displaying as raw Markdown text instead of formatted HTML tables

1.0.0

Major release — security hardening, reliability improvements, and full tag management.

Security

• Webhook signatures — Disconnect and deactivation notifications are signed with HMAC-SHA256 (X-DraftSEO-Signature, X-DraftSEO-Timestamp headers); the API key is the signing secret and is never transmitted in plain text
• Replay protection — Signed requests include a Unix timestamp; requests older than 5 minutes are rejected
• API keys encrypted at rest — AES-256-CBC with a unique IV per key, derived from the WordPress site’s auth salt

Publishing & REST API

• Tags endpoint — GET /wp-json/draftseo/v1/tags added for tag sync, matching the existing /users and /categories endpoints
• Server-side input validation — /publish and /update routes validate and sanitise all params before the handler runs
• Structured error responses — All errors return specific codes (rest_forbidden, rest_missing_param, rest_publish_error, etc.) for better debugging
• Bidirectional disconnect — Disconnecting from DraftSEO.AI calls /remote-disconnect to clear connection settings on the plugin side automatically

Reliability

• Handles security plugin blocks and maintenance pages gracefully — no silent failures when a WAF or caching layer intercepts requests
• Sync requests now have a timeout so connections never hang indefinitely
• Multi-site view: individual site connection errors are isolated so one broken connection does not affect others

Performance

• Users, categories, and tags are now fetched in parallel instead of sequentially
• Retries only fire on server errors (5xx) — client errors (4xx) fail immediately without wasting retry attempts

Tag Management

• Auto-create WordPress tags from AI-generated keywords at publish time (configurable, 1–10 tags)
• Select from existing WordPress tags, or create new ones on the fly during publishing

Image Handling

• All images downloaded directly to your WordPress Media Library
• Alt text from DraftSEO.AI preserved as WordPress image alt text
• Featured image set automatically; all image URLs in post content updated from DraftSEO.AI CDN to your local Media Library URLs

Usability

• “Settings” quick-link added to the Plugins page for faster access to plugin configuration

0.2.0

Initial beta release.

• One-click blog publishing from DraftSEO.AI
• Automatic image import from DraftSEO.ai
• SEO metadata transfer
• WordPress category sync
• Auto-create tags from keywords
• Multiple post status options (draft, publish, schedule)
• Content cleanup and formatting
• Secure API key encryption
• Background image processing for large blogs
• Remote disconnect synchronization
• OAuth-based connection flow