=== Firecrux ===
Contributors: firecrux
Tags: seo, content, reports, keywords, analytics
Requires at least: 5.7
Tested up to: 7.1
Requires PHP: 7.4
Stable tag: 1.2.21
License: GPL-2.0-or-later
License URI: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html

Your SEO service inside WordPress: articles ready to publish, content updates, weekly reports and keyword visibility — approved by you.

== Description ==

Firecrux is a content and search-visibility service. The plugin connects your WordPress site to it, so everything the service prepares for you lands where you work — in your WordPress admin — and everything it needs from you (the published content of your site) gets there without copying anything by hand.

**What you get in the plugin**

* **Projects** — articles written for your site and updates of your existing pages, each one waiting for your approval. Create a draft with one click, read it in the block editor, publish when you are happy. Nothing is published without you.
* **Reports** — weekly and monthly reports on what changed: new content, pages worth refreshing, keywords close to the top 10, technical issues found on the site. Shown right inside WordPress.
* **Tools** — project performance (positions before and after a publication), keyword visibility, topic coverage against competitors, internal link graph.
* **Data** — what Firecrux has fetched from your site and how complete it is.
* **Help** — frequently asked questions and a direct message line to the people working on your site.
* **Free tools** — small tools that run on this site itself, included with every account: HTTPS (certificate expiry with an e-mail warning, redirect http:// to https://) and Redirects (301/302/307/308 rules and "410 — gone", also with regular expressions, a hit counter, automatic rules when a post's address changes, import from Redirection and Rank Math), a 404 log (which missing addresses visitors and bots ask for, with a shortcut to redirect them) , robots.txt (switches for AI bots and for addresses search engines should skip) , llms.txt (a guide to the site for AI assistants, built from the site itself) , Security headers (HSTS and the basic protective headers, each behind a switch) , Image alt text (fill the missing alt texts from the file name or title) , Hardening (close XML-RPC, hide login names and the WordPress version, block the file editor) , Cleanup (remove old revisions, spam, trash and expired data from the database) , Broken links (find links in your content that lead to a missing address of your site) , Comment spam (catch bots in the comment form with a hidden field and a timer), Heavy images (see which images weigh the most) , Verification codes (prove to Google, Bing, Pinterest and Facebook that the site is yours), Content check (find posts that are short, old, without an image or links), Search visibility (find pages marked noindex, closed in robots.txt or pointing to another address), Headings (find pages with no main heading, several, or headings out of order — page builders included), Speed tweaks (stop loading extras most sites never use) and Maintenance mode (a "back soon" page while you work).

**How it works**

1. Install the plugin and create a Firecrux account from it (or paste a token from your agency, if an agency runs Firecrux for you).
2. The plugin sends the published content of your site to Firecrux — posts, pages, product listings — and keeps it in sync every night. Only published content, never drafts or private pages.
3. Firecrux analyses the content and your search visibility, prepares articles, updates and reports, and shows them in the plugin for your approval.

**Works with**

* Yoast SEO, Rank Math and SEOPress — the plugin reads the SEO title and description they set, it never overwrites them.
* WooCommerce — products are synced with prices, categories and stock status.
* Google Analytics 4 and Search Console — connect them from the plugin to get traffic and ranking data in your reports.
* Page builders — content is read the way the page renders, not from the raw editor.

**Free and paid**

The plugin and its Free tools are free, with no account and no time limit — open *Firecrux → Free tools* right after activation. Firecrux itself is a paid SEO service run by people: articles and page updates for your approval, weekly reports and technical fixes. The *SEO service* page in the plugin describes it and lets you ask for a free review of your site; we reply by e-mail with a proposal. Nothing is charged inside WordPress and nothing is ordered without your agreement. Sites managed by an agency see what the agency has set up for them.

== Installation ==

1. In your WordPress admin go to *Plugins → Add New*, search for "Firecrux", install and activate it. (Or upload the ZIP from *Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin*.)
2. Open *Firecrux* in the admin menu.
3. **New to Firecrux?** Choose *I'm new*, enter your e-mail and a password, confirm the e-mail we send you — the plugin connects your site and starts a short setup: language and market, how your content is classified, a first sync, Google Analytics / Search Console (optional), data sharing (optional), company details (optional).
4. **Your agency runs Firecrux for you?** Choose *I have a token*, paste the pairing token from the agency and click *Pair now*.
5. Done. The first sync runs right away; from then on every night.

Requires WordPress 5.7 or newer and PHP 7.4 or newer. The site must be reachable from the internet (Firecrux reads its content over HTTPS).

== Frequently Asked Questions ==

= Do I need a Firecrux account? =

Not for the Free tools: they work on your site without an account. You need one for what the Firecrux service makes — articles, reports and analyses. You create it from the plugin in two minutes, or your agency pairs the site for you with a token.

= What is free and what is paid? =

Free: the plugin and all Free tools (HTTPS, redirects, 404 log, broken links, robots.txt, llms.txt, security headers, alt texts and the rest), with the Checkup that sums them up. Paid: the Firecrux SEO service — a specialist, articles and page updates, weekly reports, technical fixes. You can ask for a free review from *Firecrux → SEO service*; the price comes in our reply, and you decide.

= What does the plugin send to Firecrux? =

The published content of your site (posts, pages, product listings — title, text, categories, dates, SEO title and description), your site address, and the e-mail you register with. Two optional things, both **off** until you switch them on in *Firecrux → Settings → Data sharing*: anonymous cookie-consent statistics (accepted / declined, no cookie, no visitor identifier) and a request log with anonymised IP addresses. Full list: [plugin privacy notice](https://panel.firecrux.com/firecrux-plugin-privacy-en.html).

= Does the plugin publish anything on my site by itself? =

No. Articles and updates arrive as proposals in *Projects*. You create a draft, edit it if you like and publish it yourself. The plugin only reports back that it was published.

= Does it change my SEO plugin's settings? =

No. The plugin reads the SEO title and description from Yoast SEO, Rank Math or SEOPress; it never writes them.

= Does it slow my site down? =

No. On the public site the plugin adds one small script for Google Tag Manager (page type) and, only if you switched it on, the cookie-consent beacon. All the work happens on Firecrux servers; the sync reads your content in the background at night.

= Can I use it on several sites? =

One Firecrux account per site. Agencies manage many sites from the Firecrux panel and pair each one with its own token.

= How do I disconnect or delete my data? =

*Firecrux → Settings → Disconnect* cuts the connection and removes the pairing token and any local logs. *Remove my account* deletes your Firecrux account and everything collected for it. Deactivating the plugin removes its log files and keeps everything else. Deleting the plugin removes its settings and the Free tools data (redirect rules, 404 log) from your site; your Firecrux account stays until you remove it.

= Where are the terms and the privacy policy? =

[Plugin terms of use](https://panel.firecrux.com/firecrux-plugin-terms-en.html) · [Plugin privacy notice](https://panel.firecrux.com/firecrux-plugin-privacy-en.html) · Firecrux general [Terms of Use](https://firecrux.com/terms-of-use/) and [Privacy Policy](https://firecrux.com/privacy-policy/).

== External services ==

This plugin connects to **Firecrux** (panel.firecrux.com), a service operated by Greenlogic Ltd. It cannot work without it: the service is where your account lives and where the articles, reports and analyses are made.

**What is sent, and when**

* **Account:** your site address and e-mail when you register from the plugin (or the pairing token your agency gave you); your password is sent once over HTTPS to log in and is never stored by the plugin.
* **Content sync:** the published posts, pages and product listings of this site (title, text, categories, publication and modification dates, SEO title and description), every night and when you click *Synchronize now*. Only new and changed items are sent. Drafts, private and trashed content are never read.
* **Approvals:** when you create a draft or publish an article from a Firecrux project, the plugin tells Firecrux the post ID and status, so the project can be marked as published.
* **Google Analytics / Search Console (optional):** the plugin only starts Google's consent screen; the authorisation is granted to Firecrux, not to the plugin.
* **Cookie-consent statistics (optional, off by default):** one anonymous request per banner decision — your site id and "accepted" or "declined". No cookie, no visitor identifier, no page address; the visitor's IP address is not stored (Firecrux keeps only a short-lived hash of it in memory to limit abuse).
* **Access log (optional, off by default, also has to be enabled on the service side):** the site keeps a request log for 14 days with anonymised IP addresses (last octet removed; the full address is kept only for requests that identify as a search-engine or AI crawler, so their identity can be verified) and with query-string values masked — search phrases and the query part of the referring address included; Firecrux reads finished days once a day to analyse search-engine crawling. While this is on, the plugin also checks once a day whether your hosting's own access logs (for example under /var/log or in your account's logs folder) are readable by PHP, and tells Firecrux their paths, sizes and format — never their content — so a server-side log source can be offered later. While it is off, the plugin does not look at those files at all.
* **SEO service request (only when you send the form):** your e-mail, the site address, the goal you chose, your message, and — if you leave the box ticked — the Checkup lines marked "worth a look" (you see them before sending). Sent once, to answer your request; works without an account.
* **Settings and views:** everything shown in Projects, Reports, Tools, Data and Help is fetched from the service for your account; your choices (classification, language, company details) are stored there.

**Fonts:** on the plugin's report pages inside wp-admin the "Google Sans" font is loaded from Google Fonts (fonts.googleapis.com), so the reports look like the originals. Never on the public site.

Terms of use: https://panel.firecrux.com/firecrux-plugin-terms-en.html
Privacy notice: https://panel.firecrux.com/firecrux-plugin-privacy-en.html
Firecrux general terms: https://firecrux.com/terms-of-use/ — privacy policy: https://firecrux.com/privacy-policy/

== Screenshots ==

1. Projects — articles and content updates waiting for your approval, with a one-click draft.
2. A weekly report shown inside WordPress.
3. Tools — the catalogue of views available for your site.
4. Project performance — positions and keywords before and after a publication.
5. Data — what Firecrux has fetched from the site and how complete it is.
6. Settings — connection, Google, data sharing (both switches off by default).
7. Free tools — HTTPS: certificate status and the force-HTTPS switch.
8. Free tools — Redirects: the list of rules with hit counts.
9. Free tools — 404 log: missing addresses with an "Add redirect" shortcut.

== Changelog ==

= 1.2.21 =
* Analytics: on sites measured with the Firecrux Tag Manager container, the first page of a visit is counted once, with its page type. Google's tag used to send a second page view of its own.
* Free tools work right after activation — no account needed. Welcome shows where to start.
* New *SEO service* page: what the paid Firecrux service is and a short form to ask for a free review of your site (optionally with your Checkup result).
* A short pointer to the service under the results of Content check, 404 log, Broken links, Search visibility, Headings and the Checkup.

= 1.2.20 =
* Security review follow-up (plugin and service).
* "Remove my account" now asks for your Firecrux password; the pairing token alone is no longer enough. A wrong password shows why the account was not removed.
* Maintenance mode: a `?sitemap=` added to any address no longer shows the real page during the break; real sitemaps still answer.
* Access log: a day file stops at 60 MB, old days are removed by a daily WordPress task even when nothing is written, a deleted log folder is rebuilt, search phrases and the query part of the referring address are masked. The check for your hosting's own log files runs only while the access log is switched on.
* Password-protected posts and internal post types (coupons, forms, templates) are no longer shared with Firecrux or listed in llms.txt.
* HTTPS: the daily certificate check is put back if it went missing (for example after the plugin was switched off and on), so the expiry e-mail arrives.
* Sign-up: a site address only typed at sign-up no longer blocks the real owner; the site belongs to the account that connects the plugin first.
* Sign-in: clear messages for an unconfirmed e-mail, missing fields and a busy sign-up limit.
* Report views: the stylesheet that comes with a report is filtered and kept inside the report box; the Google connection opens Google's own address only.
* The settings page no longer prints the saved pairing token.

= 1.2.19 =
* First release in the WordPress.org plugin directory.
