Anonymous Messages for WordPress

A WordPress plugin that enables site visitors to send anonymous messages through a customizable Gutenberg block with advanced spam protection, user management, and comprehensive admin features.

🚀 Features

🎯 Core Features

• Modular Gutenberg Form Builder: Leverage rearrangeable sub-blocks (InnerBlocks) to build, delete, style, and reorder input textareas, upload triggers, action buttons, and lists of answered questions.
• Full Styling Controls: Customize colors, border properties, typography sizing, margins, and padding of the parent block and inner controls natively within Gutenberg.
• Native Custom Post Type & Taxonomy Architecture: Message records, categorization terms, replies, and image uploads are saved as standard WordPress CPT items (anonymous_message), custom taxonomies, standard post content, and media attachments.
• Anonymous Messaging: Visitors can send messages without revealing their identity.
• Image Uploads: Allow users to attach images to their messages.

📱 Frontend

• Instant Search: Real-time search functionality
• Live Filtering: Combine search with category filtering
• Responsive Design: Mobile-friendly interface

⚙️ Dashboard

• Message Management: View, respond to, and manage all messages
• Multiple Response Types: Short text answers – Full WordPress posts
• Status Management: Message states: pending, answered, and featured
• Export: Export messages with filtering options
• Email Notifications: Get email alerts for new messages (sent to assigned user or site admin)
• Admin Bar Counter: See pending messages at a glance (frontend & backend, with red badge)

👥 User Management

• User-specific Inbox: Messages from specific forms can be assigned to specific WordPress users

🛡️ Security

• Google reCAPTCHA v3: Invisible CAPTCHA for spam protection
• Rate Limiting: Configurable cooldown periods between messages (default: 60 seconds)
• Honeypot Protection: Hidden fields to catch automated bots
• Input Sanitization: Comprehensive data validation and cleaning
• Nonce Verification: CSRF protection for all admin actions

🏷️ Category System

• Category Filtering: Visitors can filter answered questions by category

🔧 Integration

• Use existing post types as the designated post type for responses
• Theme Integration: Special styling for Blocksy theme using theme formats directly

🌍 Internationalization

• Translation Ready: Full multilingual support
• POT Files: Translation template included
• Arabic Translation: Complete Arabic translation included
• RTL Support: Right-to-left language compatibility

📋 Requirements

• WordPress: 5.0 or higher
• PHP: 7.4 or higher
• MySQL: 5.7 or higher
• Google reCAPTCHA: API keys required for spam protection

🛠️ Installation

Method 1: Upload Plugin

1. Download the plugin files
2. Upload the anonymous-messages folder to /wp-content/plugins/
3. Activate the plugin through the 'Plugins' menu in WordPress
4. Configure your settings in Anonymous Messages > Settings

Method 2: WordPress Admin

1. Go to Plugins > Add New in your WordPress admin
2. Upload the plugin zip file
3. Activate the plugin
4. Configure your settings

⚙️ Configuration

1. Google reCAPTCHA Setup

1. Visit Google reCAPTCHA
2. Register your site for reCAPTCHA v3
3. Copy your Site Key and Secret Key
4. Go to Anonymous Messages > Settings
5. Enter your reCAPTCHA credentials

2. Basic Settings

• Rate Limiting: Set the cooldown period between submissions
• Messages Per Page: Configure pagination for answered questions
• Categories: Enable/disable the category system
• Featured Messages: Allow marking messages as featured

3. Post Answer Configuration

Choose how you want to handle detailed responses:

• Existing Post Type: Use WordPress posts or pages
• Custom Post Type: Create a dedicated "Anonymous Answers" post type
• Disabled: Only allow short text responses

4. Image Upload Settings

• Enable Image Uploads: Allow users to attach images
• Max Image Size: Set the maximum file size for uploads
• Max Images Per Message: Limit the number of images per submission
• Allowed Image Types: Define accepted image formats (e.g., JPG, PNG, GIF)

📝 Usage

Adding the Block

1. Edit any page or post
2. Add a new block and search for "Anonymous Messages"
3. Configure the block settings:
   • Show/hide category filtering
   • Show/hide answered questions section
   • Set questions per page
   • Enable/disable reCAPTCHA
   • Assign to specific user (if configured)
   • Enable/disable email notifications for the assigned user

Block Attributes

• showCategories: Display category filter for answered questions
• showAnsweredQuestions: Show the answered questions section
• questionsPerPage: Number of questions per page
• enableRecaptcha: Enable reCAPTCHA protection
• assignedUserId: Assign messages to specific users
• enableEmailNotifications: Send an email notification to the assigned user
• placeholder: Custom placeholder text
• enableImageUploads: Allow image attachments in the block

Managing Messages

1. Go to Anonymous Messages > Messages
2. View all submitted messages and their attachments
3. Respond with short answers or create full posts
4. Assign categories and update status
5. Mark important messages as featured

Category Management

1. Go to Anonymous Messages > Categories
2. Create new categories with names and descriptions
3. Assign categories to messages from the messages page
4. Categories help organize content for visitors

🎨 Customization

CSS Styling

The plugin includes comprehensive CSS for styling:

• assets/css/block-style.css - Default styling
• assets/css/block-style-blocksy.css - Blocksy theme integration
• assets/css/admin-style.css - Admin interface styling

Theme Integration

The plugin automatically detects popular themes and applies appropriate styling. Currently includes special integration for:

• Blocksy theme
• Default WordPress themes

Hooks and Filters

The plugin provides various hooks for customization:

• anonymous_messages_before_submission
• anonymous_messages_after_submission
• anonymous_messages_message_saved
• anonymous_messages_response_created

🔧 Database Structure

Tables Created

• wp_anonymous_messages: Core message storage
• wp_anonymous_message_categories: Category management
• wp_anonymous_message_responses: Message responses
• wp_anonymous_message_attachments: Image attachment data

Database Versioning

The plugin includes automatic database migration system for updates.

🛡️ Security Features

• Input Validation: All inputs are sanitized and validated
• SQL Injection Prevention: Prepared statements for all database queries
• XSS Protection: Proper output escaping
• CSRF Protection: Nonce verification for all admin actions
• Rate Limiting: Server-side and client-side submission limits
• Capability Checks: Proper permission verification
• Secure File Uploads: Validates file types and sizes on the server

🌐 API Endpoints

AJAX Endpoints

• submit_anonymous_message: Handle message submissions (with images)
• get_answered_questions: Retrieve answered questions with filtering
• am_respond_to_message: Admin response handling
• am_update_message_status: Status updates
• am_update_message_category: Category assignment

📊 Performance

• Optimized Queries: Efficient database queries with proper indexing
• AJAX Loading: Minimal page reloads for better user experience
• Debounced Search: Optimized search with 300ms debouncing
• Pagination: Efficient handling of large datasets

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request. For major changes, please open an issue first to discuss what you would like to change.

Development Setup

1. Clone the repository
2. Set up a local WordPress development environment
3. Install the plugin in development mode
4. Make your changes and test thoroughly

📄 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

👨‍💻 Author

Hadi Alahmad

• Website: hadealahmad.com
• GitHub: @hadealahmad

🙏 Acknowledgments

• WordPress community for excellent documentation
• Google reCAPTCHA for spam protection
• All contributors and testers

📈 Changelog

Version 2.0.0

• Added: Modular Gutenberg Form Builder supporting rearrangeable sub-blocks (InnerBlocks).
• Added: Four new customizable block components (message-textarea, image-uploader, submit-button, questions-list).
• Added: Complete styling supports (colors, borders, spacing, typography) inside Gutenberg.
• Added: Standard WordPress Custom Post Type (anonymous_message) and Taxonomy (anonymous_message_category) data modeling.
• Added: Automated data migration pipeline to convert legacy database tables to native WordPress structures on plugin load.

Version 1.2.0

• Added: Image upload functionality for messages
• Added: Admin settings for image uploads (size, type, count)
• Added: Email notifications for new messages
• Added: Admin bar counter for pending messages
• Improved: Full plugin internationalization
• Fixed: Recaptcha badge now only appears where the block is present

Version 1.1.1

• fixed: Recaptcha Integration

Version 1.1.0

• Email Notification
• Dashboard Notification

Version 1.0.1

• better readme
• fixed: blocksy mobile version display issue

Version 1.0.0

• Initial release
• Core messaging functionality
• Gutenberg block integration
• Admin management system
• Security features implementation
• Multilingual support
• User assignment system
• Advanced category management

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For more information, visit the plugin homepage