Tk Listing Importer

Imports property listings from a master site running tk-listing-exporter into this site, keeping them in sync automatically. Runs on the "slave" sites (e.g. roatanmike.com, roatanbeachrealestate.com); the master is roatanlife.com.

Contents

• How it works
• Installation
• Settings
• Running a manual import
• Scheduling repeating imports
• Making the schedule reliable (server cron)

How it works

The importer pulls published listings from the master site's REST API and updates them in place — matching each local listing to its source by a hidden _tk_source_id tag. New listings are added, changed listings are updated, and listings removed on the master are taken down here. Local post IDs and page addresses (slugs) are preserved, so links keep working.

The work is done in small background batches rather than one big request, so an import can't hit the PHP timeout no matter how many listings there are. If a batch is interrupted it simply resumes on the next run — the site is never left with a half-wiped set of listings.

Installation

Place the plugin in your WordPress wp-content/plugins folder, then go to Plugins in wp-admin and activate Tk Listing Importer.

Settings

Before you start, ask the master site's admin to create an export client for you in tk-listing-exporter (Settings → Listing Export → Create Export Client). They'll give you a Provider URL and Secret Key to enter below.

Go to Settings → Listing Import. Fill in:

Click Save. The sidebar shows Last Sync and Next Sync Tick so you can see what's happening.

Note: the first sync after saving — whether triggered by Sync Now or by the first scheduled tick — can take a while before anything visibly happens. It starts by requesting a full manifest of listings from the master site, and on a master with a large number of listings that can take some time to build and return. This is normal; let it run rather than clicking Sync Now again.

Running a manual import

To import on demand:

1. Go to Settings → Listing Import.
2. Click the Sync Now button.
3. A status message next to the button updates as it works, for example "upsert — 80 remaining" → "images — 200 remaining" → "Sync complete."

You can watch it finish or navigate away — it keeps running in the background. This works reliably even for very large imports because it runs in small batches.

Scheduling repeating imports

1. Go to Settings → Listing Import.
2. Choose a Sync Frequency:
   • Off (manual only) — never runs on its own; use Sync Now
   • Daily
   • Every 3 days
   • Weekly
   • Fortnightly
   • Monthly
3. Click Save.

That's it — no sysadmin required. Behind the scenes the site checks in every few minutes and, when the interval you chose has elapsed, starts a fresh sync and then advances it a little at a time until it finishes. A large sync spreads itself out safely instead of running all at once.

Making the schedule reliable (server cron)

WordPress's built-in scheduler (WP-Cron) only runs when someone visits the site. On a busy site that's fine. On a quiet site, a scheduled sync may wait until the next visitor arrives.

For guaranteed timing regardless of traffic, add a server cron job that pings WordPress's cron endpoint on a schedule — for example every 5 minutes:

*/5 * * * * curl -s "https://roatanmike.com/wp-cron.php?doing_wp_cron" > /dev/null

When using a server cron, it's best to also disable the visitor-triggered cron by adding this to wp-config.php:

define('DISABLE_WP_CRON', true);

With that in place, the Sync Frequency setting fully controls the cadence and it fires on time, every time.