Quick Content Notes

Admin-only notes for WordPress teams — right where you work.

Private, colour-coded notes on any post or page. View them in the admin bar, search them in a dedicated dashboard, track history, assign to teammates, get email alerts. No external tools. No page slowdown.

📖 Documentation · 🐛 Report a Bug · 💡 Request a Feature · 👤 Author

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Table of Contents

• Why Quick Content Notes?
• Features
• What's New in v1.5
• Screenshots
• Installation
• Usage
• Priority Colours
• Markdown Support
• Email Notifications
• Note Templates
• Security
• Technical Details
• Customization
• Changelog
• License

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🎯 Why Quick Content Notes?

Large WordPress sites run on teams. Teams need context — reminders, client feedback, SEO targets, editorial instructions. That context usually lives in a separate Slack thread, Google Doc, or someone's memory.

Quick Content Notes puts it right inside the editor.

Without QCN	With QCN
Notes scattered across Slack, email, Docs	All notes attached to the exact post they belong to
No record of who changed what	Full version history with user & timestamp
Manually notifying teammates	Automatic email on completion or assignment
Checking notes one post at a time	Searchable dashboard with filters

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✨ Features

Core (since v1.0)

• 🔒 Admin-only visibility — notes are stored as private post meta, never rendered on the front end
• 🖊️ Meta box in post editor — clean sidebar widget for any post or page
• 🎨 5-level colour coding — Default, Important, Idea, Review, Info
• ✅ Status tracking — Active · In Progress · Completed
• 📝 Markdown support — bold, italic, links, line breaks
• 📋 Posts list column — colour-coded note previews at a glance

New in v1.5

• 🔔 Admin bar integration — live badge + status mini-menu on every admin page
• 🔍 Notes dashboard — search, filter by priority / status / assignee
• 🕐 Version history — every save creates a snapshot with user & timestamp
• 📧 Email notifications — per-event toggles (complete / assign)
• ⚡ Quick status toggle — AJAX buttons in the posts list, no page reload
• 📄 Note templates — reusable starters loadable in one click
• 👥 Multi-user assignment — assign notes to any admin or editor

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🚀 What's New in v1.5

Admin Bar Integration

A persistent Notes node appears in the WordPress admin bar on every page. It shows:

• A red badge with the count of non-completed notes
• A preview snippet of the current post's note (when on a post editor page)
• One-click status change — Active / In Progress / Completed — without leaving the page
• Quick links to the Notes dashboard and Settings

Notes Dashboard

A dedicated Content Notes page under its own admin menu gives you a bird's-eye view of every note across your entire site:

• Full-text search across note content
• Filter by priority colour, status, or assigned user
• Inline AJAX quick-toggle buttons
• One-click history modal per note
• Delete notes without visiting the post editor

Version History

Every time a note is saved (content changed), a snapshot is written to a custom database table with:

• The full note content at that point in time
• Which user saved it
• The colour and status at the time
• A human-readable timestamp ("3 hours ago")

Click the History link in the meta box or dashboard to browse the full edit trail in a modal.

Email Notifications

Configure in Content Notes → Settings:

Toggle	When it fires
Master on/off	Disables all notifications
Notify on Completed	Fires when status changes to Completed
Notify on Assign	Fires when a note is assigned to a user

Assigned users are always notified at their profile email address, regardless of the "notification email" field.

Note Templates

Create reusable note starters in Content Notes → Settings. Each template has a name, default priority colour, and pre-filled content. Load any template from the meta box dropdown — with an optional confirmation prompt if a note already exists.

Four defaults are included: Needs Review, SEO Checklist, Content Idea, Scheduled Task.

Multi-User Assignment

Assign any note to an administrator or editor. The assignee's avatar and display name appear in the Notes dashboard and posts list. Assignment triggers an email notification (if enabled).

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📸 Screenshots

Screenshots are hosted in the /assets directory of this repository.

Meta box with template picker, assign dropdown and history link	Notes dashboard — search, filter, quick-toggle, history modal
Admin bar: badge + status mini-menu + note preview	Settings page — email toggles and template builder

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📦 Installation

Via WordPress Admin (recommended)

1. Download quick-content-notes-v1.5.zip
2. In your WordPress admin go to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin
3. Select the .zip file and click Install Now
4. Click Activate Plugin

The Content Notes menu item appears immediately in your admin sidebar.

Manual Installation

# In your WordPress root
cd wp-content/plugins
unzip quick-content-notes-v1.5.zip

Then activate via Plugins → Installed Plugins.

Via WP-CLI

wp plugin install quick-content-notes.zip --activate

Database note: A single custom table ({prefix}qcn_note_history) is created on activation for version snapshots. It is removed cleanly on uninstall.

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📖 Usage

Adding a Note to a Post or Page

1. Open any post or page in the editor
2. Find the Admin Notes meta box in the right sidebar
3. (Optional) Load a template from the Load template dropdown
4. Write your note — Markdown is supported
5. Choose a Priority colour and Status
6. (Optional) Assign to a teammate
7. Save / Update the post — the note is saved automatically

Changing Status from the Posts List

Each row in the posts list shows three emoji buttons:

Button	Status set
📌	Active
🔄	In Progress
✅	Completed

Click any button — the status updates via AJAX with no page reload.

Using the Notes Dashboard

Go to Content Notes → All Notes in the admin sidebar.

• Type in the search box to filter by note content
• Use the Priority, Status and Assignee dropdowns to narrow results
• Click 🕐 History on any row to open the version history modal
• Click Edit to jump straight to the post editor
• Click Delete to remove the note permanently

Changing Status from the Admin Bar

On any admin page, click the 📝 Notes item in the top bar to open the dropdown. When you are on a post editor page, the dropdown shows the current note and three status buttons. Changes are applied via AJAX immediately.

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🎨 Priority Colours

Colour	Slug	Intended use
⚪ Default	default	General notes and everyday reminders
🔴 Important	red	Urgent — requires immediate action
🟡 Idea	yellow	Creative suggestions for future content
🟢 Review	green	Ready for review, approval, or sign-off
🔵 Info	blue	References, links, background context

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📝 Markdown Support

The meta box and dashboard render a safe subset of Markdown:

**bold text**          →  bold
*italic text*          →  italic
[Link text](https://…) →  clickable hyperlink (https/http only)
Line break             →  <br>

Full HTML is never output — all user content is escaped with esc_html() before parsing, so there is no XSS risk.

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📧 Email Notifications

Notifications are sent using the native wp_mail() function with an HTML template. No third-party mailer is required.

Configure at: Content Notes → Settings & Templates → Email Notifications

Master toggle:       ON / OFF  (disables all notifications)
Notification email:  admin@example.com  (default: site admin email)
Notify on Completed: ON / OFF
Notify on Assign:    ON / OFF

Assigned users are notified at their WordPress profile email regardless of the "Notification email" field value.

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📄 Note Templates

Templates are stored in wp_options as a serialised array and are never cached externally.

Default templates included:

Name	Colour	Purpose
Needs Review	🔴 Important	Editorial checklist before publishing
SEO Checklist	🔵 Info	Keyword, meta description, internal links
Content Idea	🟡 Idea	Idea capture with audience and deadline fields
Scheduled Task	🟢 Review	Task with responsible person and date

Add, edit, or remove templates at Content Notes → Settings & Templates.

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🔒 Security

Measure	Implementation
Capability check	current_user_can('manage_options') on every entry point
Nonce verification	Per-post nonce on meta box save; check_ajax_referer() on all AJAX endpoints
Data sanitization	sanitize_textarea_field(), sanitize_key(), absint() throughout
Output escaping	esc_html(), esc_attr(), esc_url(), wp_kses() on all output
Front-end isolation	Zero output on the public site — notes never leave the admin
SQL safety	All queries use $wpdb->prepare() with type-safe placeholders

Notes are stored with underscore-prefixed meta keys (_qcn_*), which hides them from the standard Custom Fields UI.

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🛠️ Technical Details

Plugin Architecture

quick-content-notes/
├── quick-content-notes.php          Bootstrap, constants, hooks
├── readme.txt                       WordPress.org format
│
├── includes/
│   ├── class-qcn-db.php             Custom history table + query engine
│   ├── class-qcn-meta-box.php       Post editor meta box (Singleton)
│   ├── class-qcn-admin-bar.php      Admin bar node + dropdown
│   ├── class-qcn-admin-page.php     Menu, Notes dashboard, Settings
│   ├── class-qcn-columns.php        Posts list column + quick-toggle
│   ├── class-qcn-notifications.php  Email dispatch via wp_mail()
│   └── class-qcn-ajax.php           AJAX endpoints
│
├── templates/
│   ├── meta-box.php                 Editor sidebar HTML
│   ├── admin-notes-page.php         Dashboard HTML
│   └── admin-settings-page.php      Settings & Templates HTML
│
└── assets/
    ├── css/admin.css                ~600 lines, CSS custom properties
    └── js/admin.js                  ~250 lines, jQuery AJAX & UI

Database

One custom table is created on activation:

CREATE TABLE {prefix}qcn_note_history (
    id          BIGINT UNSIGNED AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,
    post_id     BIGINT UNSIGNED NOT NULL,
    user_id     BIGINT UNSIGNED NOT NULL DEFAULT 0,
    content     LONGTEXT        NOT NULL,
    color       VARCHAR(20)     NOT NULL DEFAULT 'default',
    status      VARCHAR(20)     NOT NULL DEFAULT 'active',
    assigned_to BIGINT UNSIGNED          DEFAULT NULL,
    template_id VARCHAR(60)              DEFAULT NULL,
    changed_at  DATETIME        NOT NULL DEFAULT CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
    INDEX (post_id),
    INDEX (user_id)
);

The table is dropped and all _qcn_* post meta is removed on plugin uninstall.

Post Meta Keys

Key	Type	Description
_qcn_note_content	string	Note body (raw, unsanitized storage)
_qcn_note_color	string	Priority slug: default red yellow green blue
_qcn_note_status	string	active · in-progress · completed
_qcn_note_assigned	int	User ID of the assigned admin/editor (0 = unassigned)

Requirements

	Minimum	Recommended
WordPress	5.8	6.5+
PHP	7.4	8.1+
MySQL / MariaDB	5.6	8.0+

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🔧 Customization

Add Support for Custom Post Types

Filter qcn_post_types anywhere in your theme or a mu-plugin:

add_filter( 'qcn_post_types', function( $types ) {
    $types[] = 'product';   // WooCommerce products
    $types[] = 'event';     // Custom events CPT
    return $types;
} );

Allow Editors to See Notes

Override the capability check (add to your functions.php):

add_filter( 'qcn_required_capability', function() {
    return 'edit_posts'; // Administrators + Editors
} );

Hook Into Note Events

// Fires when a note is marked Completed
add_action( 'qcn_note_completed', function( $post_id, $assigned_user_id ) {
    // e.g. ping a project management tool
}, 10, 2 );

// Fires when a note is assigned to a user
add_action( 'qcn_note_assigned', function( $post_id, $assigned_to, $assigned_by ) {
    // e.g. post a Slack message
}, 10, 3 );

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📋 Changelog

v1.5.0 — February 2026

New features

• Admin bar integration with live badge, note preview and status dropdown
• Dedicated Content Notes admin page with full notes dashboard
• Full-text search and filters (priority, status, assignee) in the dashboard
• Note version history — every content change creates a timestamped snapshot
• Email notification system with master toggle and per-event controls
• AJAX quick status toggle directly in the posts list column
• Note templates with colour presets and a template builder in Settings
• Multi-user note assignments with avatar display in dashboard and posts list
• New In Progress status level (alongside Active and Completed)

Improvements

• Plugin architecture split into focused, single-responsibility classes
• Full i18n / l10n readiness with load_textdomain()
• Stricter data sanitization with wp_unslash() before sanitize_*()
• All SQL queries use $wpdb->prepare() with explicit type placeholders
• CSS refactored with custom properties for easy theming
• JS refactored into a single IIFE module pattern

v1.0.0 — Initial release

• Admin-only meta box in post and page editor
• 5-level priority colour system
• Active / Completed status tracking
• Basic Markdown rendering (bold, italic, links)
• Colour-coded notes column in posts and pages list

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🤝 Contributing

Contributions, bug reports and feature requests are welcome.

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a feature branch: git checkout -b feature/my-new-feature
3. Commit your changes: git commit -m 'Add some feature'
4. Push to the branch: git push origin feature/my-new-feature
5. Open a Pull Request

Please follow WordPress Coding Standards for PHP and use meaningful commit messages.

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📄 License

Licensed under the GNU General Public License v2.0 or later.

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation, either version 2 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
GNU General Public License for more details.

Full license text: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html

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Built with care by Milen Stanchev for WordPress teams who need better content coordination.

stanchev.bg · Documentation · GitHub