Future-dated Scheduled Posts Content Preview
Solution for scheduled future-dated posts consists of one WP Future Posts
plugin and one futureposts.php file.
Obviously you can have few hundreds of future posts, but I'm limiting the tool to trigger up to 59 of the most proximate posts to be published, so this will give you few months of unpacked posts with content.
For slower servers on shared hosts, I would use less than 59 future posts. You can edit the number in futureposts.php file.
I tested 99 scheduled posts generated by Posting Mage and it covers several months into the future (on average - one post every 2 or 3 days).
I got them all triggered and previewed in several minutes on ServInt VPS server.
And this solution gives you also additional benefit - I included browser with
it, so you can preview future content and do some spot checks.
For example you want to publish post about vitamins, and "answers" or "articles" may give you some inappropriate stuff which you may not want on your website.
Doing this review manually in Posts Edit in WP would take forever.
Each time you run it - you will have 59 triggered/unpacked posts to be published in the future.
And you do need those posts unpacked when using Slick Social or other bookmarking applications; otherwise all your mage-tags will be indexed by web 2.0 sites instead of content.
As a bonus, Future Post plugin comes with widget. I wouldn’t use it all the time. You can place it in sidebar and set number of future posts to be previewed to low number, between 1 and 5, as more doesn’t make sense. Just for fun, teaser preview for visitors.
Download Future Post WP plugin ver 1.4, unzip it, install in /wp-content/plugins directory like any other plugin and activate it.
Download futureposts.php file, unzip it and FTP to root of your website domain.
You can rename that file as well, if you wish, for privacy reasons.
Note. If downloaded futureposts.php file before 3pm on Jan 25, please download new version now.
To run the tool just type URL (yourdomain.com/futureposts.php) in your browser and enjoy it.
For faster results you may want to deactivate Sociable plugin while running the tool, and activate it again when done.
The Previewer could be run by cron.
Just estimate how long it would take to publish future-dated 59 posts.
Could be 2 months or more, depending on your PostingMage settings.
Then program cron to run it once a month or so.
Each time it runs, 59 posts will have content.
Suggested usage - unpack 59 future posts in one run, the rest you can schedule for cron to be run once a month.
Tip - to have your posts load faster and avoid junk content, I wouldn't use "translation". It takes a lot of resources and causes timeouts.
Actually with cron, I'd lower the number of previews to 40 instead of 59 (better for weak servers), and schedule cron to run it once a month, automatically.
Another usage is to let visitors of your website preview few of your Future-dated Posts, teaser preview. For this purpose it is the best to use Future Posts Widget and enter number of future posts to be previewed between 1 and 3.
Screenshot of future posts browser preview (click on image to enlarge)
Screenshot of future scheduled posts widget preview.
Cron Job Settings
Go to cPanel and in Advanced select Cron jobs

Select Once a month and insert Command corresponding to your website.
-q /home/username/public_html/futureposts.php

See other WP solutions for auto-generated posts and SEO tips.
Tags: content preview, cron jobs, future-dated posts preview, futuredated scheduled posts content preview, wordpress pluginLeave a Comment





Comments on Future-dated Scheduled Posts Content Preview
Lee Wilson @ 1:29 pm
Hey Mark,
Nice plugin.
Future feature suggestion…make the body text a bit larger and definitely more space between the lines. Right now it’s an un-confrontable mass of text and I want people to actually read it.
My 2
Lee
Mark @ 2:27 pm
Hi Lee,
Are you referring to futureposts.php browser preview or to Widget preview?
The browser preview are not really designed to be read by users, just to get future content loaded and previewed.
But you can go and edit fut.css and increase font size
.ucp_showexcerpt {
font-size: 11px;
line-height: 10px;
}
Lee Wilson @ 9:24 pm
Hi Mark,
Thanks that’s what I did. I forgot about the edit. Looks a bit better.
Lee
Mike @ 5:23 am
Mark,
Thanks for your hard work on this. It is great. Maybe a little info on how to set up a cron to run automatically
Mark @ 12:50 am
Cron jobs instructions added
Luke @ 12:26 am
Hi Mark,
Does this thing attempt to unpack posts that have already been unpacked?
For instance, if I set it to unpack 59 once a month, but somehow only 49 posts are posted that month, then next month will it simply try to unpack from the current date forward 59 posts (thereby overlapping 10 posts that were still unpacked last month) or will it remember where it left off and unpack the literal next 59?
Thanks again,
Luke
brian @ 9:41 pm
do you turn of ebay/phpbay before running this ? or just remove the auction.php file
Mark @ 10:14 pm
Brian,
No need to turn anything off or removing auction.php.
Future Posts will just let you unpack and preview content. It is not clicking on any links.
Jonathan @ 6:14 pm
Mark
when I try to activate the plugin it comes up with an error message
“the plugin does not have a valid header”
Can you help
thanks
Mark @ 8:45 pm
Jonathan,
What version of WP are you using?
Nobody reported any problems with header.
Maybe you opened the php file and tried to modify something using inappropriate editor (which will put erroneous, invisible characters to php files, causing errors).
Remove the file you have and download the original file and activate again.
I just tested on WP 2.9.2 and 2.9.1 and it works perfect.
Mike FD @ 5:07 am
Hi Mark,
thanks for the software opportunty -its great.
Now I have downloaded as suggested and the plugin rsides in the plugin directory and the php file is in the root directory but going to the dashboard and looking at the plugins, the Futureposts plug in does not appear?
Any suggestions, thanks
Cheers,
Mike FD
Mark @ 1:20 pm
Mike,
It will be in Manage Plugins – Inactive.
After you activate it, it will show up in Active Plugins.
jose @ 7:05 pm
Hi Mark,
i came to your site through Autoblog Blueprint 2.0. I wanted to install your plugin but i am getting the same error that i read in previous “the plugin does not have a valid header”. i am using WP 2.9.2.
i also FTP the files but when i do this i do not get to see the plugin in the Plugins page in WP. Any ideas?
Mark @ 8:23 pm
Hola Jose,
I think I know what happened. When I zipped the plugin it had 2 sub-folders.
So when you unzipped – you got future-posts.1.4 folder, then under it it was another future-posts.1.4 folder and then it was plug in future-posts which you should FTP to WP.
Now it is fixed. When you move plugin to wp-content/plugins – just future-posts should be used, not future-posts.1.4
Chris @ 11:58 am
Hi Mark,
I have followed your post above and activated the plugin, but it is not appearing in the Settings area. The widget is there and working. Any ideas?
All the best
Chris
Mark @ 5:14 pm
Chris,
Are you on WP 2.9.2?
Please check the post above, to be sure that future-posts folder is directly in wp-content/plugins directory and not in future-posts sub-folder folder inside another future-posts directory (folder).
Jemma @ 8:30 pm
Hi, Mark,
I have been referred to you by Autoblog Blueprint to use your plugin with autoposting plugins using shortcodes. Does the plugin work on WP.3.01? I tried to use it with Reviewazon plugin to unpack the posts for WebTrafficGenius rss submission but stll see the shortcode in submitted feeds. I followed your instructions as above. Any ideas? Thanks for your help.
Jemma
Mark @ 10:42 pm
Jemma,
I’ll check when WP 3.1 is released. We are in 3.01 now, so hopefully 3.1 will come soon. It unpacks Future (scheduled) mage posts and shows any future posts.
Haven’t checked Reviewazon. I’m using phpZon.
Bart Humbol @ 2:29 am
Hello Mark
I was wondering if Future Posts will be able to unpack
ReviewAZON posts? I can’t seem to get it to work right now.
Thanks alot!
Mark @ 1:41 pm
Bart, I don’t use Reviewazon.
I use phpZon and phpBay which don’t require any unpacking.
Steve @ 7:01 pm
Mark
Handy plugin.
Mage posts do not display content attribution even the options are checked. e.g ezine resource box etc..
Wouldn’t that be noncompliance with the source? Or is there a solution for this?
Thanks