Don’t Let AI Break Your WordPress: Design Your Abilities Smart

I had a client come to me, buzzing about integrating AI to manage their WordPress content. The dream was a truly “smart” platform, one where an AI assistant could effortlessly draft, revise, and publish posts. Sounds great on paper, right? But the existing API design they had was a total mess of generic CRUD operations. It was confusing the AI, leading to unpredictable behavior, and frankly, a bit dangerous. We’re talking about giving an AI direct access to your site’s data; you can’t afford ambiguity.

My first instinct? Just map the AI directly to the existing REST API endpoints. Maybe throw a few wrapper functions around them. Easy, right? Wrong. That quickly showed its limits. You can’t just tell an AI “update a post” and expect it to magically know which fields it can touch, or what kind of post. Does “delete” mean sending to trash or permanent removal? WordPress has its nuances, man. It was a security and logic nightmare waiting to happen, trust me on this.

Crafting Granular WordPress Abilities for AI

The core problem boils down to how WordPress abilities—the actions an AI can perform—are defined. The recent Core-AI contributor check-in (you can read the full discussion here) highlighted this exact issue. Lump everything into a single “CRUD” ability for a post type, and you’re asking for trouble. An AI needs precision.

The recommendation, and the pragmatic approach we now champion, is to break operations into separate abilities. Instead of one `bbioon_manage_post` ability, you define `bbioon_create_post`, `bbioon_read_post`, `bbioon_update_post`, and `bbioon_delete_post`. Why? Clearer annotations. Marking “delete” as destructive means the AI knows this isn’t just a casual click. While ‘create’ and ‘update’ can often be combined with a simple ID parameter distinction, ‘read’ and ‘delete’ demand their own specific abilities.

Then there’s the post type issue. Do you create one mega-ability that handles *any* post type via a parameter? Or discrete abilities for each? The group leaned towards discrete abilities: `bbioon_create_page`, `bbioon_create_product`, etc. This prevents AI models from getting confused by WordPress’s often-overloaded terminology (e.g., a “post” of type “post”). It keeps things explicit, reducing misinterpretations and unexpected side effects. Period.

Permissions are another kicker. WordPress’s granular, context-aware permission levels are critical. Your abilities need to respect that. Implementing an “ability vetting check” to pre-filter what an AI can even *see* based on a user’s role is non-negotiable. You don’t want an AI trying to delete a page if the underlying user role can only edit posts.

Organization also plays a huge role in scalability. Using namespaces to indicate ownership and categories to group related functions helps AI models navigate a growing list of abilities. Imagine an AI first asking for “content management” abilities, then diving into “post creation.” That’s how you build a robust, understandable system. Here’s a simplified example of how you might register a category for abilities:

<?php
add_action( 'bbioon_register_ability_categories', 'bbioon_register_content_category' );

function bbioon_register_content_category() {
    bbioon_register_ability_category(
        'content',
        __( 'Content Management', 'bbioontheme' ),
        __( 'Abilities related to creating, reading, updating, and deleting posts, pages, and custom post types.', 'bbioontheme' )
    );
}

// And then, when registering an actual ability:
add_action( 'bbioon_register_abilities', 'bbioon_register_create_post_ability' );

function bbioon_register_create_post_ability() {
    bbioon_register_ability(
        'bbioon_create_post',
        __( 'Create a new WordPress post.', 'bbioontheme' ),
        'content', // Assign to the 'content' category
        [
            'title'   => [ 'type' => 'string', 'description' => 'The title of the post.' ],
            'content' => [ 'type' => 'string', 'description' => 'The HTML content of the post.' ],
            'status'  => [ 'type' => 'string', 'enum' => ['publish', 'draft'], 'description' => 'The status of the post.' ]
        ],
        'bbioon_create_post_callback',
        [ 'destructive' => false ]
    );
}

function bbioon_create_post_callback( $args ) {
    // Logic to create a post
    return wp_insert_post( [
        'post_title'   => $args['title'],
        'post_content' => $args['content'],
        'post_status'  => $args['status'],
        'post_type'    => 'post'
    ] );
}
?>

So, What’s the Real Takeaway?

The point is, building robust AI integration in WordPress isn’t about slapping a generic API on it and hoping for the best. It’s about thoughtful, granular design. It’s about understanding the nuances of WordPress, breaking down complex operations, and providing clear, unambiguous instructions to your AI. This way, you empower your AI without risking your site’s integrity or security.

Look, this stuff gets complicated fast. If you’re tired of debugging someone else’s mess and just want your site to work, drop my team a line. We’ve probably seen it before.