“Autolinks Manager” Documentation by “DAEXT” v1.12

“Autolinks Manager”

Created: 29/06/2020
By: DAEXT
Email: support@daext.com

Thank you for using Autolinks Manager. If you have any questions that are beyond the scope of this help file please contact us via email or with the contact form available in our CodeCanyon Profile.

Video Tutorials
Installation (Single Site)
Installation (Multisite)
Update (Single Site)
Update (Multisite)
Statistics Menu
Wizard Menu
Autolinks Menu
Categories Menu
Term Groups Menu
Tracking Menu
Import Menu
Export Menu
Maintenance Menu
Options Menu
Credits
FAQ

A) Video Tutorials

This video series covers the functionalities of the Autolinks Manager plugin.

Please note that not all the aspects and implications are covered in this section, it's recommended that you read the entire documentation (FAQ included) before using this plugin in a production environment or asking for support to the plugin author.

B) Installation (Single Site)

With this procedure you will be able to install the Autolinks Manager plugin on your WordPress website.

Visit the Plugins -> Add New menu
Click on the Upload Plugin button and select the zip file you just downloaded
Click on Install Now
Click on Activate Plugin

C) Installation (Multisite)

This plugin supports both a Network Activation (the plugin will be activated on all the sites of your WordPress Network) and a Single Site Activation in a WordPress Network environment (your plugin will be activated on single sites of the network).

With this procedure you will be able to perform a Network Activation:

Visit the Plugins -> Add New menu
Click on the Upload Plugin button and select the zip file you just downloaded
Click on Install Now
Click on Network Activate

With this procedure you will be able to perform a Single Site Activation in a WordPress Network environment:

Visit the specific site of the WordPress Network where you want to install the plugin
Visit the Plugins menu
Click on the Activate button

Please note that this plugin should be not activated on sites of a WordPress Network managed by untrusted users. The ability of the untrusted users to create an unlimited number of autolinks in the Autolinks and in the Wizard menus might expose your website to DOS attacks caused by an overload of your server CPU.

D) Update (Single Site)

With this procedure you will be able to update the Autolinks Manager plugin:

Visit the Plugins menu
Click on Deactivate
Update the plugin files with your favorite FTP client (delete the files of the old version and add the files of the new version)
Click on Activate

E) Update (Multisite)

To update the plugin in all the sites of your WordPress Network follow this procedure:

Visit the Plugins menu
Click on Network Deactivate
Update the plugin files with your favorite FTP client (delete the files of the old version and add the files of the new version)
Click on Network Activate

To update the plugin in single sites of the WordPress Network follow this procedure:

Visit the specific site of the WordPress Network where you want to update the plugin
Visit the Plugins menu
Click on Deactivate
Update the plugin files with your favorite FTP client (skip this step if you have already updated the plugin files during the plugin update of another single site of the WordPress Network)
Click on Activate

The Statistics menu allows you to generate statistics about the autolinks applied in the posts, pages and custom post types of your blog.

You can generate these data for the first time or update your data by following this procedure:

Visit the Autolinks -> Statistics menu
Click the Generate button
Wait until the analysis of the posts is completed

Each row of the generated table will present the following information:

Post ID - The post ID
Post - The post title
Content Length - The length of the raw (with filters not applied) post content
Autolinks - The number autolinks applied on the post
Clicks - The number of clicks generated with the autolinks applied on the post

With the Download button available in the Export CSV section you can export all the data in CSV format. For details on how to read the generated CSV files in a spreadsheet software see the FAQ How to import the generated CSV data in a spreadsheet software.

The Wizard menu gives you the ability to generate multiple autolinks in a single operation.

To create autolinks proceed as follows:

Visit the Autolinks -> Wizard menu
In the Name field enter the name that will be assigned to all the autolinks generated with this procedure
In the Category field select if you want to assign the autolinks to a specific category
In the Data table enter a list of keywords (in the first column) with the related URLs (in the second column)

Please note that when the autolinks are created with the Wizard menu the other information associated with the autolink will be automatically retrieved from the options defined in the Defaults tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu.

The Autolinks menu allows you to create an autolink at a time and specify all the information associated with the autolink.

To create an autolink enter the following information:

Name - The name of the autolink.
Category - The category of the autolink.
Keyword - The keyword that will be converted to a link.
URL - The destination address of the link automatically generated on the keyword.
Title - The title attribute of the link automatically generated on the keyword.
Open New Tab - If you select "Yes" the link generated on the defined keyword opens the linked document in a new tab.
Use Nofollow - If you select "Yes" the link generated on the defined keyword will include the rel="nofollow" attribute.
Post Types - With this option you are able to determine in which post types the defined keywords will be automatically converted to a link. Leave this field empty to convert the keyword in any post type.
Categories - With this option you are able to determine in which categories the defined keywords will be automatically converted to a link. Leave this field empty to convert the keyword in any category.
Tags - With this option you are able to determine in which tags the defined keywords will be automatically converted to a link. Leave this field empty to convert the keyword in any tag.
Term Group - The terms that will be compared with the ones available on the posts where the autolinks are applied. Please note that when a term group is selected the "Categories" and "Tags" options will be ignored.
Case Sensitive Search - If you select "No" the defined keyword will match both lowercase and uppercase variations.
Left Boundary - Use this option to match keywords preceded by a generic boundary or by a specific character.
Right Boundary - Use this option to match keywords followed by a generic boundary or by a specific character.
Keyword Before - Use this option to match occurences preceded by a specific string.
Keyword After - Use this option to match occurences followed by a specific string.
Limit - With this option you can determine the maximum number of matches of the defined keyword automatically converted to a link.
Priority - The priority value determines the order used to apply the autolinks on the post.

Please note that the default values of the various field available in the form are based on the options defined in the Defaults tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu.

The Categories menu allows you to create categories for the autolinks.

To create a category proceed as follows:

Visit the Autolinks -> Categories menu
In the Name field enter the name of the category
In the Description field enter the description of the category
Click the Add Category button

With this menu you will be able to create term groups. A term group is a an entity that includes from 1 to 50 terms. Each term present in a term group will be compared with the ones available on the posts where the autolinks are applied, if the considered post has at least one term present in the term group the autolink will be applied.

To create a term group proceed as follows:

Visit the Autolinks -> Term Groups menu
In the Name field enter the name of the term group
With Post Type 1 select the post type for which you want to retrieve the taxonomies
With Taxonomy 1 select the taxonomy for which you want to retrieve the terms
With Term 1 select the term that will be compared with the ones available on the posts where the autolinks are applied
Repeat steps three to five if you want to include other terms in the term group

Please note that you can increase or decrease the number of terms available in the Term Groups menu with the Supported Terms option available in the Advanced tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu.

In the Tracking Menu you will be able to see the clicks performed on the autolinks.

When the click of the user is tracked the following information are stored:

Tracking ID - An auto-generated value used to identify the click
IP Address - The IP address of the user that performed the click
Date - The date on which the autolink has been clicked
Autolink - The autolink associated with the tracked click
Post - The post, page or custom post type that includes the autolink that received the click

With the Reset button available in the Reset Tracking section you can delete all the tracked clicks.

The Import menu should be used to import autolinks, categories and term groups previously stored inside XML files generated with the Export menu.

Import your autolinks, categories and term groups with this procedure:

Visit the Autolinks -> Import menu
Click the Choose File button and select the XML file that includes the autolinks, categories and term groups
Click the Upload file and import button to start the process
Verify the number of autolinks, categories and term groups actually imported by reading the message provided at the end of the procedure

The Export menu gives you the ability to generate an XML file with included all your autolinks, categories and term groups.

Export your autolinks, categories and term groups by following this procedure:

Visit the Autolinks -> Export menu
Click the Export button
You can now access to the generated XML file from your downloads folder

The Maintenance menu gives you the ability to automatically perform repetitive operations.

The following tasks are available:

Delete Autolinks
Delete Categories
Delete Term Groups
Delete Tracking

To execute a task proceed as follows:

Visit the Autolinks -> Maintenance menu
With the Task field select the task that you want to perform
With the From and To field select the range of IDs on which the task should be performed
Click the Execute Task button

The Options menu includes a total of 50 options, you can hover the mouse over the question mark available on the right of each option to receive additional information on how the specific option should be used.

P) Credits

This plugin makes use of the following resources:

Chosen licensed under the MIT License
Handsontable licensed under the MIT License

For each library you can find the actual copy of the license inside the folder used to store the library files.

Q) FAQ

How to import the generated CSV data in a spreadsheet software?

All the CSV data generated with this plugin can be imported in your favorite spreadsheet software by selecting the following options:

Character Set -> Unicode (UTF-8)
Text Delimiter -> Double Quotes
Separator -> Comma

How to enable specific plugin menus to specific users?

In the Capabilities tab available in the Autolinks -> Options menu you can select the capability required to get access on specific plugin menus.

If you are not familiar with the WordPress roles and capabilities please check out Roles and Capabilities. To grant the access to a specific plugin menu only to specific users find the proper capability by using the Capability vs Role table.

For security reasons the access to the Autolinks -> Options menu is only granted to the users with the "manage_options" capability, and by default this capability is available only to the Administrator and to the Super Admin roles.

How to solve performance and post analysis issues?

The analysis on your posts performed in the Autolinks -> Statistics menu can be slow if one or more of the following conditions occur:

The blog has a high number of posts and you are not limiting the analysis of the posts with the Limit Posts Analysis option
You have defined a high number of autolinks
Your server performance are below the norm

To avoid errors such as "Maximum execution time of x seconds exceeded" or "Allowed memory size of x bytes exhausted" it's important to consider that:

Some server have a limited maximum number of seconds to execute the PHP scripts and long running scripts can't be completed. If this is your case simply set "Yes" on the Set Max Execution Time option and enter an appropriate value in the Max Execution Time Value option.
Sometimes the PHP memory limit is very limited and long running scripts can't be completed. If you want to increase the PHP memory limit set "Yes" on the Set Memory Limit option and enter an appropriate value in the Memory Limit Value option.

Please note that the custom max_execution_time and memory_limit values defined with the plugin will be applied only on a limited selection of long running scripts used by the plugin and won't affect any script outside the plugin.

It's also important to note that in some cases the custom max_execution_time and memory_limit values defined through the plugin options (and actually applied with the ini_set() PHP function) might be ignored. In such cases you have to configure your server (or ask to your hosting provider to configure your server) with different values in the max_execution_time and memory_limit directives.

If the max_execution_time and memory_limit values defined through the plugin option are ignored and your current hosting plan doesn't allow you to increase these values even manually after a support ticket, the only solution is to set the Limit Posts Analysis option with a value smaller than 1000 and not exceeding more than 100 keywords in the Autolinks menu.

How the Test Mode works?

The Test Mode is an option available in the Advanced tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu.

When the test mode is enabled your autolinks will be actually applied on the front-end of your website only to the WordPress users that have the capability defined with the Autolinks Menu option available in the Capabilities menu.

This means that, when the test mode is enabled, only the users that have access to the Autolinks menu will actually see the autolinks applied on the posts. This allows you to easily test the application of the autolinks in a production environment.

It's therefore obvious, but important to note, that if the test mode is enabled, your visitors and your logged-in users that don't have the required capability won't see any autolink applied to your posts.

Please also note that while in test mode, the data and statistics generated in the back-end of the plugin will consider the autolinks applied. This behavior allows you to have more information about your applied autolinks before you actually activate them (by disabling the test mode) to your visitors.

What are the Protected Tags?

The Protected Tags option, available in the Advanced tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu, allows you to not apply the autolinks on specific tags present in your posts.

Let's say that you have created an autolink that converts the word "dreamer" to a link, but you don't want to convert the word "dreamer" inside a blockquote element with the quote "You may say that I'm a dreamer but I'm not the only one". You can solve the problem simply by adding the tag "blockquote" in the list of protected tags.

Please note that by protecting non-void tags you prevent any nested element from having applied an autolink.

What are the Protected Gutenberg Block?

The Protected Gutenberg Blocks option, available in the Advanced tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu, allows you to not apply the autolinks on specific Gutenberg Blocks present in your posts.

For more information on the Gutenberg Project please check out this article.

The "Generic" boundary available in the select box of the Left Boundary and Right Boundary options and in the Autolinks menu is a generic boundary able to detect transitions between Unicode characters and Unicode non-characters.

For example if you assign the "Generic" boundary as the Left Boundary of the keyword "cat", the keyword will be matched by the regular expressions in the following cases:

" cat"
",cat"
"-cat"
"!cat"

but not on the following cases:

"zcat"
"àcat"
"ìcat"

The "None" boundary available in the select box of the Left Boundary and Right Boundary options and in the Autolinks menu allows you to match keywords without considering the transition between the keyword and the preceding or following characters.

For example if you assign the "None" boundary as the Left Boundary of the keyword "cat", the keyword will be matched by the regular expressions in any of the following cases:

" cat"
",cat"
"-cat"
"!cat"
"zcat"
"àcat"
"ìcat"

Which personal data are collected by this plugin?

The link tracking feature collects the IP address of the users that perform clicks on the autolinks.

In case you don't want to collect personal data of the users proceed as follows:

Visit the Tracking tab of the Autolinks -> Options menu
Set the value of the Enable Click Tracking option to "No"

If instead you want to keep the link tracking feature active but delete the data of specific users when they request you to do so proceed as follows:

Visit the Autolinks -> Tracking menu
Enter the IP address of the user for which you want to delete the personal data in the search field and click the search button
Use the trash button to delete the records associated with the clicks of the user

Which versions of PHP are supported?

PHP 5.3 and later versions are supported.

Which versions of WordPress are supported?

WordPress 4.5 and later versions are supported.