WP Branches For Post

Description

WP Branches For Post provides a Git-like editorial workflow for WordPress content.

Instead of editing a published post in place, create a draft branch. The public original remains unchanged while the branch is edited. When the work is ready, explicitly merge the branch back into the same original post ID.

Version 2.0 modernizes the original 2020 plugin for the current WordPress block editor and REST API.

Core workflow

1. Open a published, private, or scheduled post/page/custom post type.
2. Choose “Create branch”.
3. Edit the isolated draft branch.
4. Review the branch status in the Post Branch panel.
5. Merge into the original when ready.
6. The original keeps its URL, ID, publication status, author, date, comments, and external identity.
7. The merged branch is moved to Trash instead of being permanently deleted.

Safety

• Branches are kept non-public and cannot accidentally replace the original by pressing WordPress Publish.
• Every new branch stores a snapshot of the original state.
• If the original changes after the branch was created, a normal merge is blocked.
• A force merge is available only as an explicit action after review.
• REST endpoints use WordPress capability checks in permission callbacks.
• The plugin no longer updates revisions or attachment parents with direct SQL.
• WordPress creates the normal revision history when the original post is updated.

What is synchronized

During merge, the plugin synchronizes editable post content, post meta, and all taxonomies while preserving the original post identity and publication state.

Media IDs referenced by post content and featured-image meta remain the same. Attachments are not re-parented.

Block Editor

The Post Branch document panel shows:

• Create Branch on an original post.
• Existing active branches.
• Original post link from a branch.
• Conflict status.
• Merge into original.
• Force merge after review when a conflict exists.
• Discard branch.

Classic Editor, post-list row actions, and the admin bar retain lightweight compatibility controls.

Compatibility with 1.x

Version 2.0 recognizes branches created by the 1.x metadata format.

Legacy branches do not contain a baseline snapshot, so they are reported as “unknown” conflict state and require an explicit force merge after the original has been reviewed.

The old automatic “publish branch to overwrite original” behavior has intentionally been removed.

About the Author

WP Branches For Post is maintained by Hao Kexin, a full-stack engineer and product builder based in Japan. Since 2018, his work has spanned requirements, system design, application development, data systems, deployment, observability, and long-term production operations.

His current work focuses on public data, financial analysis, AI, and end-to-end product engineering. He builds and maintains projects including Time2Analyze, a production system for public-company disclosures, structured financial data, analysis, Excel, MCP, and AI workflows.

More about the author and current projects: https://time2log.com/about/

Developer Notes

Useful filters and actions include:

• wbfp_branchable_post_statuses
• wbfp_create_branch_post_data
• wbfp_excluded_meta_keys
• wbfp_mergeable_post_fields
• wbfp_branch_created
• wbfp_before_merge
• wbfp_after_merge

Security-critical invariants remain enforced after extension filters run: a new branch stays a draft of the same post type, required runtime meta stays excluded, and mergeable core fields are limited to the plugin’s editorial allowlist.

See ARCHITECTURE.md for the create/merge data flow and SECURITY.md for authorization, CSRF, REST, conflict, and data-synchronization boundaries.

CI is intentionally not triggered for every feature-branch commit. Full PHP/build/Plugin Check validation runs on master, release tags, or manual workflow dispatch.

The Block Editor source is in src/index.js and is built with @wordpress/scripts.

Human-readable source code and build tooling are maintained at https://github.com/hsxk/WP-Branches-For-Post/.