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benecaster_podcast2_transcript_autodetect

Filter Free

Fills an episode’s Podcasting 2.0 Transcript URL from somewhere other than the media library. Benecaster’s own auto-detection scans the episode’s attached media for a single .vtt, .srt or .txt file and writes the one it finds; this filter is the seam for everything else — a transcription service, an S3 bucket, a naming convention on your own CDN.

Runs on every episode save, but only when the Transcript URL field is empty, so a URL you return can never overwrite one the podcaster typed — you don’t need to check that yourself. $url arrives as Benecaster’s own detected URL, or null when it found nothing usable: no transcript-shaped attachment, or more than one, which Benecaster deliberately refuses to guess between. You can’t tell those two cases apart from here; read the attachments yourself if you need to.

Returning a non-empty string also suppresses the “several transcript files are attached” admin notice, since the field needs no human to fill it in. Return null (or '') to leave the field alone — that’s how you switch Benecaster’s detection off entirely.

The stored MIME type is then inferred from the returned URL’s extension (.vtt → text/vtt, .srt → application/srt, .json → application/json, .txt → text/plain, .html → text/html). An extension not in that list leaves the stored type untouched rather than forcing a wrong one.

Fires from Benecaster\Episode\TranscriptAutodetector, called at the end of EpisodeMetaSaver::save() — every save path routes through there, so one callback covers the React editor’s REST save, the classic editor, and your own save() calls. It does not fire on a save that never reaches the saver — a bare wp_update_post() with no Benecaster meta in play writes nothing and detects nothing.

Parameters

Name Type Default Description
$url ?string — Benecaster's detected transcript URL, or null when it found nothing usable.
$episode_id int — ID of the episode being saved.

Returns: ?string

Examples

Supply a transcript URL from your own service

add_filter(
    'benecaster_podcast2_transcript_autodetect',
    function ( ?string $url, int $episode_id ): ?string {
        // Let Benecaster's media-library detection win when it found something.
        if ( null !== $url ) {
            return $url;
        }

        $external_id = get_post_meta( $episode_id, '_my_service_transcript_id', true );
        if ( '' === $external_id ) {
            return null; // Nothing to offer — leave the field empty.
        }

        // Keep the extension: it is what sets the transcript type.
        return 'https://transcripts.example.com/' . rawurlencode( (string) $external_id ) . '.vtt';
    },
    10,
    2
);

Disable built-in detection entirely

add_filter( 'benecaster_podcast2_transcript_autodetect', '__return_null', 99 );

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