Description
This plugin lets a user subscribe and unsubscribe to posts within a certain category or categories.
Subscribers will recieve an e-mail with a link to the actual post. E-mails to subscribers are sent once every hour with WP Cron.
The HTML form is prepared for Bootstrap framework.
Subscribers are saved as a custom post type with a possibillity to export(excel). Unsubscription needs to be confirmed by the subscriber.
The following settings and features are available for the administrator in current version:
- Change e-mail sender from default
- Change the title/subject for e-mails
- Turn CSS on/off
- Export subscribers to Excel with a possibillity to filter by categories
- Run the cron job manually so it will fire immediately
- Theres a note when next scheduled event for sending e-mails to subscribers is running.
- Options for leave no trace – deletes post meta and subscribers created by this plugin.
- Option for re-send a post on update that has already been sent.
- Implementation by widget or short code.
What Translations are included?
- Dutch
- English
- French
- German
- Italian
- Japanese
- Lithuanian
- Norwegian
- Russian
- Spanish
- Swedish
Have you translated this plugin to another language? Please send me your files to info@dcweb.nu and I will add them to the plugin.
Screenshots
Installation
This section describes how to install the plugin and get it working.
- Upload
subscribe-to-category
to the/wp-content/plugins/
directory - Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress Admin
- Save your settings ‘Settings > Subscribe’.
- Create a page and add shortcode [stc-subscribe] or use the STC Widget to display stc form subscription.
Shortcode Attributes
‘category_in’ – Use this attribute if you only want one or several categories to be available for subscription. Value to be entered is the name of the category.
‘category_id_in’ – The difference to above is to use the category ID instead of category name.
‘category_not_in’ – Use this attribute if you want to exclude categories to be available for subscription. Value to be entered is the name of the category.
‘category_id_not_in’ – The difference to above is to use the category ID instead of category name.
For the above attributes you can use a comma sign to separate multiple categories, like [stc-subscribe category_in=”news, article”].
Filter and hooks
Following filters and hooks can be used for customizing the email message.
<?php
// FILTERS
// Parameters: $value
add_filter( 'stc_message_length_sum_of_words', 'stc_message_length_sum_of_words', 10, 1 ); //set return value to a negative number to show the full content
// Parameters: $value, $post_id, $subscriber_post_id
add_filter( 'stc_message_title_html', 'my_stc_message_title_html', 10, 3 );
add_filter( 'stc_message_link_to_post_html', 'my_stc_message_link_to_post_html', 10, 3 );
add_filter( 'stc_message_unsubscribe_html', 'my_stc_message_unsubscribe_html', 10, 3 );
// HOOKS
// Parameters: $post_id, $subscriber_post_id
add_action( 'stc_before_message', 'my_stc_before_message', 10, 2 );
add_action( 'stc_before_message_title', 'my_stc_before_message_title', 10, 2 );
add_action( 'stc_after_message_title', 'my_stc_after_message_title', 10, 2 );
add_action( 'stc_before_message_content', 'my_stc_before_message_content', 10, 2 );
add_action( 'stc_after_message_content', 'my_stc_after_message_content', 10, 2 );
add_action( 'stc_after_message', 'my_stc_after_message', 10, 2 );
// Parameters: $subscriber_post_id, $categories, bool $all_categories
add_action( 'stc_after_update_subscriber', 'my_stc_after_update_subscriber', 10, 3 );
add_action( 'stc_after_insert_subscriber', 'my_stc_after_insert_subscriber', 10, 3 );
// Parameters: $subscriber_post_id,
add_action( 'stc_before_unsubscribe', 'my_stc_before_unsubscribe', 10, 1 ); // runs before deleting a subscriber from database
/**
* Example for adding featured image to STC email
*/
function my_stc_after_message_title( $post_id ){
echo get_the_post_thumbnail( $post_id, 'thumbnail' );
}
add_action( 'stc_after_message_title', 'my_stc_after_message_title', 10, 2 );
?>
Optionally but recommended
As WordPress Cron is depending on that you have visits on your website you should set up a cron job on your server to hit http://yourdomain.com/wp-cron.php at a regular interval to make sure that WP Cron is running as expected. In current version of Subscribe to Category the WP Cron is running once every hour, that might be an option that is changeable in future versions.
Therefore a suggested interval for your server cron could be once every 5 minutes.
Reviews
Not Update! [Bad plugin].
No update!
Great
Uses shortcodes to let your users subscribe to category posts. I like that the developer made it possible to exclude or include categories from the list. I have posts that are just for updating the slider and was able to exclude those from the subscription list. Thanks!
fine, but…
I just tested the plugin,
it seems that it is what I need, but I already encountered two problems.
It says new subscriber, but I think that should have been new subscription. Really confusing.
The second is that a user at subscriber level cannot see the plugin. I had to set it at least as contributor in order to make visible the plugin. After I figured out these, it was ok, the mail for the new post was queued fine, sent (manually) But still waiting for the mail to come. I have to figure where it got stuck. I hope to pass over this because I like the plugin.
FINALLY! A simple subscription plugin!
I’ve been looking for a plugin like this for ages, thank you so much for developing it.
Super easy to use and configure, does exactly what I want and there was absolutely no hassle with setup.
Thank you again for your excellent work on this.
nice
This is the only plugin that I have found that let the user subscribe to category fronten using shortcode. The plugin is exellent, but I have to find a woy to autofill mail adress for logged in members since I plan to use it on a member only site..
Awesome plugin, would get 5 stars if it included just a few more features
This plugin makes subscriptions super simple. I needed something to set up for my clients who aren’t code savvy, and this fit almost all their needs. A few extra features to easily control post content in the email as well as the link text and it would have been 5 stars. Otherwise it’s perfect.
Contributors & Developers
“Subscribe to Category” is open source software. The following people have contributed to this plugin.
ContributorsTranslate “Subscribe to Category” into your language.
Interested in development?
Browse the code, check out the SVN repository, or subscribe to the development log by RSS.
Changelog
1.9.0
- Email address preset for logged in users.
- Japanese, Dutch, German and Norwegian language added.
1.8.1
- Added pot file to be used for translation.
- Bugfix – changed textdomain to string instead of constant.
1.7.0
- Added some new hooks: stc_after_update_subscriber, stc_after_insert_subscriber, stc_before_unsubscribe.
1.6.0
- Added a Widget for subscription form.
- Don’t show category list if only one is available (thanks to davefx).
- Extended short code attributes with an option to use category id instead of category name (thanks to Stingray_454).
1.3
- Added hooks and filters to make the plugin extensible.
- Added Lithuanian language.
1.2.1
- Fixed some undefined variables that might have caused some errors for some environments.
- Renamed language files for russian language to correct syntax.
- Added Italian language.
1.2.0
- Possibillity to re-send a post on update that has already been sent. This option needs to be activated in the settings for the plugin.
- Attribute ‘category_in’ added to shortcode to show only entered categories in the subscribe form. Multiple categories are separated by a comma sign.
- Attribute ‘category_not_in’ added to shortcode to exclude categories in the subscribe form. Multiple categories are separated by a comma sign.
1.1.0
- Added php sleep() function to prevent sending all e-mails in the same scope.
- Using Ajax when send is manually triggered in back-end.
1.0.0
- First release