Set first image as featured

Hi Whizbangweb, I did not implement this option because there are already many plugins for this. Take a look at the search result.

For example take a look at

• https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/post-featured-image-generator/
• https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/automatic-thumbnail-generator/
• https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/automatically-set-1st-image-as-featured/

Hinjiriyo, Thanks for the list of alternatives. I looked at each of those. The first one was the most promising, but when I tried to run batch generation, NOTHING happened. Could be that it’s only compatible up to v3.7.1 The second one is also out of date and has a one star rating. The third one only works if you pay. I don’t mind paying, but I got a Web of Trust warning about the developer’s site as spammers. I did watch their video and it only shows being able to set a featured image for posts with no images, nothing about setting the first image in the post as the featured image. I’ve tried several plugins so far and nothing seems to exist that does what I want to do and/or is out of date and not supported.

Seems like there is a need for this type of plugin. I can see that I would use it on several sites.

Still looking…
Emily

Hello Emily, thank you for your feedback. In the meanwhile I took a closer look into the code of several of such plugins. The most of them consider only new posts. But you want to set the featured image of past posts.

So I will implement this function. It will take a few days due to other works and will come out in the plugin version 5.0. I will write a notice here if the function is out.

To make it clear what you want:

1. select the option to use the first image of a post to set the image as the post’s featured image
2. select whether to consider posts with featured images already set or not
3. use the filters, e.g. tag filter, search filter or skip them (as already implemented)
4. take a preview of found posts with their current featured image and their future featured image
5. confirm the changes and see the results

For the version 5.0 only images in the media library will be considered, not images embedded by URL from other sites. This could be an option in the future.

Ok?

That sounds great, Hinjiriyo. Thanks a million! Looking forward to trying it out!!!

Emily, the new action “Set first post image as featured image” is out now with the plugin version 5.0.

I love good usability experiences and would do much efforts to achieve it in my software. If you have any topic to say about it (and other things about the plugin) feel free to write it here.

Martin

Hi Martin,

Thank you for your quick response! I just tried this out, and nothing happened. I selected to set the first image in the post as the featured image with no filters and no featured images were set.

The first thing I noticed was that on the confirmation page, it lists “Proposed Featured Image”, however, when selecting the option of setting first image in post to be featured image, no image was showing up in this column unless it was a post that already had a featured image set.

I thought maybe it would work anyway, so I ran the plugin, but the list at the end showed the same as above. I double checked, and there were no featured images added to any post that didn’t already have one assigned.

As I went through running the plugin, here are a couple other suggested features (Please tell me if these things are already possible):

1. The ability to apply only to posts with no featured image already set.

2. The ability to add a default image to any post that contains no images to pull a first image from (I didn’t see a filter for this).

Thanks again for working to improve and expand functionality of your plugin!

Emily

The latter action or filter is a great idea! Thank you!

The action affects only posts with no featured image. I will described it explicitly in the next plugin version.

The action ignores images embedded via URL pointing to external servers. Could this be the reason for your experience?

Would to tell me the address of the website where you have tried the plugin? I would take a look into the frontend HTML code to find an answer.

None of the images are external, so that shouldn’t be the issue.

This is the development address for the site I’m currently working on: https://webdev42.com/whimsical/blog/

As an aside, I’m not sure of the process or how long it takes for WP to show that a plugin update is available, but there was no notification in the dashboard so I had to uninstall the older version of the plugin and then install the new version. No big deal, just fyi.

Thanks!

Hello Emily, normally it needs some minutes after uploading the plugin into the repository to get a notice in a WP backend.

I took a look at your site and saw many images coming from thewhimsicalsweet.files.wordpress.com. This address differs from the domain name of the site. So these images are not considered.

I also saw some images coming from the blog domain but having a query string in their URL. These image are not yet considered. I will adapt the recognition pattern to catch also these images.

Taking images from other servers is tricky, because it means to grab them, store them in the media library automatically and set them as featured images. I need some time to code a function for that.

Hi Martin, Thanks for looking into that for me! That must have happened during the migration from wordpress.com. All of the images were pulled into the media library, but for some reason they are pulling from the .com site instead of the media library. I’ll have to do a search and replace in BackupBuddy to fix that and then your plugin should work.

I did try your plugin in another site and it worked perfectly!

Please do let me know when you have the added function of adding a default image to posts that have no first image to set as featured. I’ve got a couple of sites I will run that on right away.

Thanks again for all of your help!!!
Emily

I’m working on some changes, e.g. a better search pattern for first images in posts and your desired function. I think about finishing in the next week and will inform you here.

Hi Martin,

An update on the site I was originally using this plugin for. I got the image paths correct in the database (at least all the posts I’ve tested so far), so they are now pulling from the media library instead of the old wp.com site. However, it is still not finding all of the first images in each post. Not sure why. Here’s the link of the dev site again: https://webdev42.com/whimsical/

I thought of another feature! I LOVE that this plugin takes care of past posts, is it possible to also have a setting (that could be toggled on or off) to set the first image in each post (or default image for posts that have no images) each time a NEW post is created? This would be a big help for novice bloggers such as I have on one of my blogs with several people blogging.

Emily

Hi Emily, I’m working on a better search pattern for finding images. The current pattern works only if the image’s post name is equal its file name.

Your last wish is possible. It would be a great extension if the plugin would handle new posts and offers all functions to make a blogger’s life more comfortable in case of featured images. Like a swiss army knife for all purposes.

I think about that, it needs conception works first. Please go on writing every idea you got for that plugin ??