WP Document PDF Demo

A small WordPress plugin that shows how I build document workflows for membership sites: versioned document templates → member acceptance records → generated PDFs → per-member archive and email.

It is intentionally compact so the whole design can be reviewed in a few minutes.

Features

• Versioned templates — admins edit documents (agreements, notices) as a custom post type. Every real content change creates a new version, and the full text of each version is stored.
• Acceptance records — members accept the latest version from a page; the plugin records who accepted which version and when.
• PDF generation — the accepted version is rendered with the member's details ({{ member_name }}, {{ date }}, …) and saved as a PDF with Dompdf.
• Member archive — [wpdd_my_documents] lists everything the member has signed, with secure downloads.
• Email — the signed PDF is emailed to the member.

Usage

1. Activate the plugin (tables and the storage folder are created on activation).
2. Create a document under Document Templates. Use placeholders such as {{ member_name }}, {{ member_email }} and {{ date }}.
3. Add [wpdd_document id="123"] to a page where members should read and accept it.
4. Add [wpdd_my_documents] to the member account page.

Add site-specific values (e.g. a subscription plan or membership number) with a filter:

add_filter('wpdd_template_vars', function (array $vars, WP_User $user): array {
    $vars['membership_no'] = get_user_meta($user->ID, 'membership_no', true);
    return $vars;
}, 10, 2);

Design decisions

• Versions are immutable snapshots. An acceptance points to a version number, and that version's text never changes, so you can always prove exactly what a member agreed to. Whitespace-only edits (common when the block editor re-saves) don't create a new version.
• Members can only accept what they actually saw. The form submits the version shown on the page; if the template changed in the meantime, the acceptance is rejected and the member is asked to review again.
• Missing data fails loudly. If a template uses a placeholder with no value, rendering stops instead of producing a legal document with blanks.
• Signed PDFs are private. Files live under uploads/wpdd-documents/ with direct access blocked, and are served only after a nonce check and an ownership check done in the database query.
• Idempotent acceptance. Double submits don't create duplicate records or emails.
• Testable core. Placeholder rendering and versioning rules are plain PHP classes with no WordPress dependency, covered by PHPUnit tests that run in CI.

Project structure

src/
  Plugin.php                 Hooks, shortcodes, request handlers (WordPress glue)
  TemplateRenderer.php       Placeholder rendering with escaping       ← unit tested
  VersionPolicy.php          When an edit becomes a new version        ← unit tested
  VersionRepository.php      Template version snapshots ($wpdb)
  AcceptanceRepository.php   Acceptance records ($wpdb)
  PdfGenerator.php           Dompdf wrapper (remote fetching disabled)
  Storage.php                Protected PDF storage
  Installer.php              Tables + storage folder on activation
tests/                       PHPUnit tests

Development

composer install
composer test

Not included (out of scope for a demo)

• Migration of documents and records from a legacy plugin. In a real project I would build it as a WP-CLI command with a dry-run mode that reports counts before writing anything.
• Admin screens for browsing all acceptances, and integration tests against a WordPress test install.

License

GPL-2.0-or-later