README

This package provides baseline functionality for WordPress. Some of the functionality includes:

Cleanup of unnecessary WordPress features
Enhanced security measures
SVG, JSON, and Lottie upload support, admin-only by default
Cleanup of the admin dashboard
Duplicate post/page functionality, respecting per-post edit permissions

Status: private, pre-1.0. The public surface is not stable yet and breaking changes land without deprecation cycles until 1.0.

Requirements

PHP >= 8
WordPress >= 6

Installation & Usage

This library is meant to be dropped into a theme or plugin via composer.

In your WordPress project directory, run: composer require siratik/baseline.
In your main plugin file or theme's functions.php, add:

if (class_exists('Siratik\Baseline\Baseline')) {
    $baseline = Siratik\Baseline\Baseline::instance();
    $baseline->boot();
}

Features

Disable Comments

Comments remain enabled by default. To disable them, set this filter to return true:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_disable_comments', '__return_true');

When comments are disabled, the package comprehensively removes all comment functionality:

Backend Changes:

Removes comment support from all post types
Closes comments on all existing posts
Removes Comments menu from admin
Removes Discussion settings page
Removes comment widgets from dashboard
Redirects comment admin pages to dashboard
Removes comment link from admin bar
Disables comment REST API endpoints
Disables block editor notes (prevents /wp/v2/comments?type=note requests when the REST route is removed)

Frontend Changes:

Disables comment feeds
Removes Recent Comments widget
Dequeues comment reply scripts
Removes discussion panel from block editor

Block Editor:

Removes all comment-related blocks including:
- Comment templates and content
- Comment forms and reply links
- Comment pagination
- Latest comments
- Post comment counts and links

Howdy Text

By default the "Howdy" text is removed from the admin bar. You can customize this and add your own text using the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_howdy_text', function ($text) {
    return 'Hey,';
});

Admin Bar

By default the WP logo, search, and updates nodes are removed from the admin bar. They can be re-enabled using the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_clean_admin_bar', '__return_false');

Dashboard Widgets

Most core dashboard widgets are removed. They can be re-enabled using the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_remove_dashboard_widgets', '__return_false');

Emojis

Emojis are disabled. They can be re-enabled using the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_disable_emojis', '__return_false');

Auto Update Emails

Auto update emails are disabled. Additionally, the from name in the email is customized based on the site name. This functionality can be reverted back to the default by using the filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_disable_update_emails', '__return_false');

Asset Version Numbering

Wordpress adds a version query argument to all enqueued assets by default. This exposes the version number, which can be a security risk. This package replaces the version number with filemtime of the theme's style.css file by default with a fallback to date('Ymd'). However, you can set a custom version by defining a constant in your theme or plugin:

define('YOUR_THEME_VERSION', '1.2.9');
add_filter('siratik_baseline_asset_version_constant', function () {
    return 'YOUR_THEME_VERSION';
});

Security Headers

Security headers are implemented by default for enhanced security. These include:

Content Security Policy (CSP)
X-Content-Type-Options
X-Frame-Options
And more...

To disable all security headers:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_enable_security_headers', '__return_false');

To modify specific headers or CSP rules, use these filters:

// Modify security headers
add_filter('siratik_baseline_security_headers', function($headers) {
    // Customize headers
    $headers['X-Frame-Options'] = 'DENY';
    return $headers;
});

Login Security

When enabled (default), login security includes:

Require email address for sign-in (username attempts are rejected)
Update the login field label and placeholder to "Email address"
Return a generic login error message for credential failures (username-format attempts show a specific message)
Always clear the login field after a failed sign-in attempt
Disable browser autocomplete on login fields

WordPress normally repopulates the login field when the submitted email exists but the password is wrong, while clearing it for unknown emails. That behavior leaks account existence even with a generic error message. This package remaps those core error codes so the field is always cleared after failure.

To disable login security enhancements, use the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_login_security', '__return_false');

REST API User Endpoints

REST API user endpoints are restricted to users with the list_users capability by default. To disable this restriction and make the user endpoint publicly accessible again use this filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_disable_user_rest_endpoints', '__return_false');

Author Enumeration

Requests like ?author=2 are blocked with a 404 by default for anyone without the list_users capability, instead of being redirected to /author/username/ and revealing a valid username. Author archive URLs themselves (/author/username/) are unaffected. To disable this:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_block_author_enumeration', '__return_false');

XMLRPC

XMLRPC is disabled by default. To re-enable it, use the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_disable_xmlrpc', '__return_false');

SVG Support

Adds support for SVG uploads. SVGs are automatically sanitized upon upload using the enshrined/svg-sanitize library for security to remove potentially malicious content.

To disable SVG support, use the following filter:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_enable_svg_uploads', '__return_false');

Additional MIME Types

Support for JSON and Lottie file uploads is available but disabled by default for security.

To enable JSON uploads:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_enable_json_uploads', '__return_true');

JSON uploads are checked for well-formed structure by default (and the manage_options capability is re-checked on the upload prefilter). application/json is never executed by a browser or server, so there is nothing an upload-time transform can safely do to make it "sanitized" the way SVG sanitization does — content is validated but never rewritten. Detection keys off the .json extension or a declared application/json type so a spoofed Content-Type cannot skip the check.

To disable the structural check (not recommended):

add_filter('siratik_baseline_sanitize_json_uploads', '__return_false');

To enable Lottie uploads:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_enable_lottie_uploads', '__return_true');

Lottie validation runs automatically once Lottie uploads are enabled (default true). A .lottie upload must be either valid Lottie JSON, or a real dotLottie ZIP archive containing a manifest.json and an animations/ directory — an arbitrary file renamed to .lottie is rejected. Archive members with path traversal (.., absolute paths) or executable-ish extensions (e.g. .php, .exe, .htaccess) are rejected even when the required names are present; the manifest and at least one animations JSON entry must also be well-formed JSON. Archive validation requires the zip PHP extension; without it, non-JSON .lottie uploads are rejected (fails closed).

To disable Lottie validation:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_validate_lottie_uploads', '__return_false');

To customize Lottie file size limit (default: 10MB):

add_filter('siratik_baseline_lottie_max_file_size', function() {
    return 5 * 1024 * 1024; // 5MB
});

Upload Capability

SVG, JSON, and Lottie are mime types WordPress core disallows by default; this package is what unlocks them, so all three require the manage_options capability (administrators only) regardless of which of the filters above enabled the type. This is checked both when the mime type is registered and again at sanitize/validate time, so a plugin adding the mime type some other way can't bypass it.

To allow broader access (e.g. Authors or Editors uploading SVGs):

add_filter('siratik_baseline_mime_upload_capability', function ($capability, $mime_key) {
    // $mime_key is one of 'svg', 'json', 'lottie'.
    if ('svg' === $mime_key) {
        return 'upload_files';
    }
    return $capability;
}, 10, 2);

Duplicate Post

Adds a "Duplicate" action to post and page row actions, allowing users to quickly create copies of existing content. Duplicated posts are created as drafts and include all content, meta fields, and taxonomies.

The feature is enabled by default for all post types, gated on the same per-post edit_post capability WordPress core uses to decide whether a user can open that post to edit it — a user who can edit their own posts but not others' (e.g. the Author role) can duplicate their own posts but not someone else's. To customize or disable:

// Disable duplicate post functionality entirely
add_filter('siratik_baseline_duplicate_post_config', function($config) {
    $config['enabled'] = false;
    return $config;
});

// Limit to specific post types
add_filter('siratik_baseline_duplicate_post_config', function($config) {
    $config['post_types'] = ['post', 'page', 'product'];
    return $config;
});

// Disable for specific post types
add_filter('siratik_baseline_duplicate_post_config', function($config) {
    // Get all public post types
    $post_types = get_post_types(['public' => true]);
    // Remove the ones you don't want
    unset($post_types['attachment']);
    $config['post_types'] = array_keys($post_types);
    return $config;
});

// Deny duplication for a specific post (list link + admin action)
add_filter('siratik_baseline_can_duplicate_post', function($can, $post) {
    if ($post instanceof WP_Post && get_post_meta($post->ID, 'my_locked_meta', true)) {
        return false;
    }
    return $can;
}, 10, 2);

When a post is duplicated:

The new post is created as a draft with "(Copy)" appended to the title
All custom fields and meta data are copied
All taxonomies (categories, tags, etc.) are preserved
The user stays on the posts list with a success message
A link to edit the duplicate is provided in the success notice

Block Uploads PHP Execution

Many hosts already block PHP execution inside the uploads directory at the server level. Baseline adds the same rule in .htaccess so the protection is in place even on hosts that don't set it up themselves — closing off a common technique for persisting malicious code after a compromise. Enabled by default. To disable this:

add_filter('siratik_baseline_block_uploads_php_execution', '__return_false');

This only controls Baseline's own .htaccess rule. If your host already blocks PHP execution in uploads at the server level, that protection is independent of this filter and stays in place either way.

This rule has no effect on nginx. .htaccess is an Apache (and LiteSpeed) mechanism; nginx doesn't read it. On nginx, this filter still fires and generates the rule, but nothing ever consumes it — the site is not protected by this feature. Add the equivalent block to your nginx server config directly, e.g.:

location ~* /wp-content/uploads/.*\.(?:php|phtml|php\d?|phar)$ {
    deny all;
}

Disclaimer

This software is provided "as is", without warranty of any kind, express or implied, including but not limited to the warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and noninfringement. In no event shall the authors or copyright holders be liable for any claim, damages or other liability, whether in an action of contract, tort or otherwise, arising from, out of or in connection with the software or the use or other dealings in the software.

Use of this library is at your own risk. The authors and contributors of this project are not responsible for any damage to your website or any loss of data that may result from the use of this library.

While we strive to keep this library up-to-date and secure, we make no guarantees about its performance, reliability, or suitability for any particular purpose. Users are advised to thoroughly test the library in a safe environment before deploying it to a live site.

By using this library, you acknowledge that you have read this disclaimer and agree to its terms.

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