Drive the WordPress REST API (/wp-json/wp/v2) with curl + jq.
The user's self-hosted WordPress credentials are injected as env vars:
$WORDPRESS_SITE_URL— site root, e.g.https://blog.example.com$WORDPRESS_USERNAME— the WordPress login username$WORDPRESS_APP_PASSWORD— an Application Password (WP 5.6+ core), NOT the login password. Treat it like a secret — never log or echo it.
Auth is HTTP Basic (username:app_password) over HTTPS. Set up a reusable base
once, then every call reuses it:
# Normalize the site URL (strip a trailing slash) and build the API base.
SITE="${WORDPRESS_SITE_URL%/}"
API="$SITE/wp-json/wp/v2"
# -u sends HTTP Basic auth; --fail-with-body surfaces the JSON error body on 4xx/5xx.
WP=(curl -sS --fail-with-body -u "$WORDPRESS_USERNAME:$WORDPRESS_APP_PASSWORD")
Don't add
-L/--locationto these calls. A redirect usually means the site URL is wrong. curl strips theAuthorizationheader when a redirect crosses host or scheme (e.g.http→https, apex→www) — exactly the cases that occur here — so the followed request runs unauthenticated and can return the site's HTML page with HTTP 200: it looks like success but wrote nothing. Fix the URL instead (see the/wp-jsongotcha below).
Errors come back as {"code": "...", "message": "...", "data": {"status": 401}} —
show message verbatim. Common codes:
| HTTP | Meaning | What to tell the user |
|---|---|---|
| 401 | incorrect_password / bad Basic auth |
Application Password wrong or revoked → regenerate it and reconnect the WordPress connector |
| 401 | rest_not_logged_in on a plain-http:// site |
Application Passwords are disabled without HTTPS → the user must enable HTTPS |
| 403 | rest_cannot_create / insufficient role |
The user's role can't publish; needs Author/Editor/Admin, or Application Passwords are disabled on the site |
| 404 | rest_no_route |
REST API disabled or a security plugin blocks /wp-json → the user must re-enable it |
| 400 | rest_invalid_param |
Bad field (e.g. unknown category id) → fix and retry |
| 500 | rest_upload_sideload_error |
wp-content/uploads isn't writable by the web server → the user must fix directory permissions |
contentis HTML, not Markdown. Raw Markdown renders literally.pandocis not installed — convert with Python'smarkdownpackage (preinstalled in the sandbox). If the import ever fails,pip install markdownfirst, then:HTML=$(python3 -c " import sys, markdown print(markdown.markdown(sys.stdin.read(), extensions=['fenced_code','tables'])) " <<'MD' ## 标题 正文 **粗体** MD )
Step 0 — verify the connection first
"${WP[@]}" "$API/users/me?context=edit" | jq '{id, name, slug, roles}'
context=edit is required — without it WP omits roles/capabilities entirely,
so you cannot tell whether the account may publish. A 200 with roles containing
administrator, editor or author confirms the site URL, username, Application
Password and publish permission. If this fails, stop and surface the error —
don't attempt writes.
Publish or draft a post
Publishing is public and hard to undo — confirm with the user before using
status=publish. Default to status=draft and hand back the edit link.
jq -n --arg t "国内如何稳定调用 Claude API" \
--arg c "<p>正文 HTML……</p>" \
--arg s "draft" \
'{title:$t, content:$c, status:$s}' \
| "${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/posts" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" -d @- \
| jq '{id, status, link, edit: "\(env.WORDPRESS_SITE_URL)/wp-admin/post.php?action=edit&post=\(.id)"}'
With categories / tags / excerpt (ids come from the endpoints below):
jq -n --arg t "标题" --arg c "<p>正文</p>" --arg e "一句话摘要" \
'{title:$t, content:$c, excerpt:$e, status:"draft",
categories:[5], tags:[12,34]}' \
| "${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/posts" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d @- \
| jq '{id, status, link}'
- Publish an existing draft:
POST $API/posts/<id>body{"status":"publish"}. - Update a post:
POST $API/posts/<id>with any subset of fields (WP REST uses POST, not PUT, for updates). - Delete (trash) a post:
"${WP[@]}" -X DELETE "$API/posts/<id>". - Schedule a post:
{"status":"future","date_gmt":"2030-01-01T00:00:00"}(UTC, no trailingZ).
SEO fields that actually matter
WordPress core emits <link rel="canonical"> on its own but ships no meta
description tag at all — that only appears if the site runs an SEO plugin
(Yoast, Rank Math, SEOPress) or a theme that renders one. Those consume the
post's excerpt, so setting excerpt is what makes a good description possible;
it does nothing on a bare core install. For an SEO post always set:
| Field | Why |
|---|---|
slug |
The permalink. Set it explicitly to a short ASCII keyword phrase — otherwise a CJK title becomes a percent-encoded URL. |
excerpt |
Source for the SEO plugin's meta description and for list-page summaries. One sentence. |
categories / tags |
Internal linking + topic clustering. |
featured_media |
Social/OG card image. |
media alt_text |
Image SEO + accessibility. Set it on the media object (below). |
jq -n --arg s "claude-api-guide" --argjson c 3 --argjson m 9 \
'{title:"如何稳定调用 Claude API:完整对接指南",
slug:$s,
content:"<h2>小标题</h2><p>正文</p>",
excerpt:"一句话摘要,用于 meta description。",
status:"publish", categories:[$c], featured_media:$m}' \
| "${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/posts" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d @- \
| jq '{id, status, slug, link}'
Before publishing: check for a duplicate
WordPress will NOT reject a duplicate slug — it silently appends -2, so an
unattended/scheduled run that reposts the same article creates an endless trail of
near-identical URLs that compete with each other in search. Always pre-check:
SLUG="claude-api-guide"
# Fail CLOSED at BOTH steps: a failed request, or a 200 that isn't a JSON array
# (HTML from a redirect/permalink issue, or an error object), must abort — never
# fall through and create the duplicate this check exists to prevent.
if ! LOOKUP=$("${WP[@]}" "$API/posts?slug=$SLUG&status=publish,draft,future&_fields=id,link"); then
echo "duplicate check failed (request error) — aborting" >&2; exit 1
fi
if ! EXISTING=$(printf '%s' "$LOOKUP" | jq -er 'if type=="array" then (.[0].id // "") else error("not a JSON array") end'); then
echo "duplicate check failed (unexpected response) — aborting" >&2; exit 1
fi
if [ -n "$EXISTING" ]; then
echo "already exists as post $EXISTING — update it instead of creating a new one"
# update: "${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/posts/$EXISTING" ...
fi
Prefer updating the existing post over creating a near-duplicate. This matters most in Scheduled Tasks, where nobody is watching the output.
List / read posts
"${WP[@]}" "$API/posts?per_page=10&status=publish,draft&_fields=id,title,status,link,date" \
| jq '.[] | {id, title: .title.rendered, status, link, date}'
Paginate with &page=2; the total page count is in the X-WP-TotalPages
response header (add -D - to see headers).
Categories & tags (get or create ids)
# List existing
"${WP[@]}" "$API/categories?per_page=100&_fields=id,name,slug" | jq '.[] | {id, name}'
"${WP[@]}" "$API/tags?per_page=100&_fields=id,name,slug" | jq '.[] | {id, name}'
# Create one (returns its id)
jq -n --arg n "AI 教程" '{name:$n}' \
| "${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/categories" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d @- \
| jq '{id, name}'
Creating a term that already exists returns
{"code":"term_exists", ... "data":{"status":400,"term_id":<id>}} — reuse
.data.term_id instead of failing.
Upload media (featured image / in-body image)
FILE="./cover.png"
NAME="$(basename "$FILE")"
MEDIA_ID=$("${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/media" \
-H "Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=\"$NAME\"" \
-H "Content-Type: image/png" \
--data-binary @"$FILE" | jq -r '.id')
echo "media id=$MEDIA_ID"
# Set alt text (image SEO + accessibility) — a separate call on the media object.
jq -n --arg a "Claude API 架构图" '{alt_text:$a}' \
| "${WP[@]}" -X POST "$API/media/$MEDIA_ID" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" -d @- | jq '{id, alt_text}'
# Attach as the post's featured image:
# add "featured_media": <MEDIA_ID> to the post body.
Gotchas
HTTPS is effectively required for Application Passwords. WP gates them on
wp_is_application_passwords_available(), which is false on a plain-http://production site → authenticated calls fail withrest_not_logged_in(401). (The gate is filterable and is bypassed whenWP_ENVIRONMENT_TYPEislocal, so a dev box may still work — but any real site the user connects must serve HTTPS.)$WORDPRESS_SITE_URLmust exactly match the site's configured address. If it differs (missing/extrawww,httpvshttps), WP answers/wp-json/...with a 301 to the canonical host. Fix the stored site URL in the connector rather than papering over it with-L.A security plugin / host may block
/wp-json(Wordfence, "disable REST API" plugins, some managed hosts). Symptom: 404rest_no_routeor an HTML login page instead of JSON. The user must allow REST API access.Pretty permalinks may be off. If
/wp-json/wp/v2/...returns the site's HTML instead of JSON, the site is on plain permalinks — use the always-available query form instead:$SITE/?rest_route=/wp/v2/posts.The Application Password contains spaces (e.g.
abcd efgh ijkl mnop). Keep them —curl -uhandles the spaces fine; don't strip them.Never publish silently. Even if the user says "post it", prefer creating a draft and returning the
wp-adminedit link unless they explicitly asked to go live. (In an unattended Scheduled Task the user has pre-authorized the run, so publishing directly is expected there — but still run the duplicate check.)
Record the output
After you successfully publish and obtain the live result URL, call the built-in
publish_artifact tool ONCE so the user can track this deliverable in My Outputs:
publish_artifact(kind="article", channel="wordpress", title="<title>", url="<the REAL returned URL>", status="delivered")
Use the real returned URL — never fabricate one. Call it once per published item,
only after delivery is confirmed; skip it (or use status="failed") if publishing failed.
See _shared/artifacts.md.