Changelog

LLMs.txt - file now generates reliably - The LLMs.txt file failed to generate or regenerate on sites where the legacy rankbix_seo_llmstxt_enabled database option had previously been set to disabled. The enabled state is now read from the module toggle (consistent with all other modules) rather than the stale option, so the file is written correctly whenever the LLMs.txt module is active - no manual workaround or settings re-save needed.

Sitemap cache - busts on term edits and unpublish - The cached sitemap was not invalidated when a category or tag was edited, or when a published post was moved back to draft or private. Both gaps are now covered: editing any taxonomy term triggers a cache bust via the edited_term hook, and any post transition away from published does the same.

robots.txt - created vs updated feedback - The “Generate robots.txt” button now reports “robots.txt created.” when no file existed, and “robots.txt updated.” on subsequent saves, so you can tell at a glance whether the file was new or replaced.

IndexNow - pings on trash, delete, and unpublish - IndexNow previously only pinged search engines when a post was published or updated. It now also pings when a post is trashed, permanently deleted, or moved to draft or private, so search engines are notified promptly to re-crawl and drop the URL from their index.

Duplicate Page - admin notice after duplicate - After duplicating a post, a dismissible success notice now appears at the top of the page with a direct “Edit the new draft” link, making it easy to open the copy immediately without hunting for it in the post list.

Breadcrumbs - Untitled fallback - Breadcrumb ancestor links and the current-page label no longer show an empty label when a post has no title. “Untitled” is displayed instead, keeping the trail readable.

LLMs.txt - preview of auto-generated default in settings - The LLMs.txt settings field now includes a collapsible “Preview auto-generated default” section showing exactly what the plugin would write to /llms.txt if the content field is left blank, so you can review it before deciding whether to customise it.

Image Alt Audit — New admin page at Rank Bix SEO → Image Alt Audit. Browse all media images, see missing-alt stats, fix inline, and auto-fill all missing in 30-image AJAX batches with character-count colour coding. Toggleable from the Features page.

FAQ & HowTo Gutenberg Blocks — Two dynamic blocks (rankbix-seo/faq, rankbix-seo/howto) inject FAQ and HowTo JSON-LD schema automatically. Server-side rendered so schema stays current without re-saving posts.

Page Builder Content Extraction — New RankBixSEO_ContentExtract class reads real post content from Elementor, Beaver Builder, Bricks, Oxygen, Divi, and WPBakery. All keyword analysis, readability scoring, and AI generation now use page-builder-aware content.

robots.txt Editor & Tester — Replaces the plain textarea with a two-tab widget. The Editor tab shows syntax-highlighted WP-managed rules (read-only) plus an editable custom rules area with continuous line numbers. The Tester tab evaluates any URL path against any crawler using the Google longest-path-wins spec, returning an Allowed/Blocked badge and the matching rule.

Toolbar — SEO score badge — Colour-coded score badge (green 70+, amber 40–69, red below 40) next to the plugin name in the admin bar when viewing or editing a singular post. Reads the stored score — no on-the-fly recalculation.

Toolbar — Mark this page — Submenu with instant AJAX toggles for Cornerstone Content, NoIndex, and NoFollow. A green ✓ shows the active state with no page reload. Works on the frontend and in the post editor.

Toolbar — Duplicate shortcut — A Duplicate link appears directly in the Rank Bix SEO toolbar (after Settings) when the Duplicate module is enabled, the post type is allowed, and the user has the required role. Replaces the old standalone admin bar button.

robots.txt — physical file support — When a physical robots.txt exists at the site root the Editor reads and displays it. New Regenerate, Delete, and Generate buttons manage the file without FTP.

Settings — 404 Monitor tab visibility — The 404 Monitor tab in Settings is now hidden when the module is disabled.

Settings — Save Settings button on 404 Monitor tab — The Save Settings button is now hidden automatically when the AJAX-only 404 Monitor tab is active.

Redirections — notices in page header — Action notices (saved / deleted / updated) now render as flash banners above the form, not inside the header layout.

Features page — New Rank Bix SEO → Features page with toggle switches for individual modules: XML Sitemap, Redirections, 404 Monitor, Duplicate Page, Breadcrumbs, IndexNow, LLMs.txt, Broken Link Checker, Table of Contents, and Robots.txt. Data is preserved when a module is disabled.

Content Manager — Bulk SEO Editor and Import SEO are now unified under Rank Bix SEO → Content Manager with two tabs, replacing the previous separate submenu items.

Multilingual — Polylang & WPML — SEO title, description, and focus keyword are registered as translatable fields with Polylang Pro. SEO meta is auto-copied when a new translation is created. WPML support via wpml_object_id filter.

XML Sitemap — hreflang alternates — Multilingual sites (Polylang / WPML) now include <xhtml:link rel="alternate" hreflang="..."> tags for every available translation, plus an x-default entry.

Admin navigation — Sidebar nav adds Content Manager and Features as dedicated items. Redirections, 404 Monitor, and Duplicate Page are hidden automatically when their module is disabled.

Sitemap under Settings — Sitemap configuration moved to Settings → Sitemap tab. The old standalone menu item 301-redirects for backwards compatibility.

XML Sitemap structure corrected — sitemap index now properly outputs <sitemapindex> listing individual sub-sitemaps per content type rather than a flat <urlset>.

“Back to Sitemap Index” navigation link now functions correctly.

404 Monitor enhancements — added summary stat cards (Total URLs, Total Hits, Top URL, Last 24h) and a 14-day bar chart showing new 404 URLs discovered daily.

Bulk SEO Editor coverage panel — displays percentage of posts with SEO title and meta description set, with fillable progress bars and “Fix N missing” quick-links.

Google SERP preview — live search result preview below the Homepage Meta Description field in General settings, updating in real time as you type.

Duplicate Page SEO copy control — new checkbox controls whether SEO title, description, focus keyword and noindex flag are copied to duplicated posts (enabled by default).

Sitemap XSLT browser view u2014 XML sitemaps now include a stylesheet processing instruction, rendering a styled HTML page in browsers while remaining clean XML for crawlers.

WordPress Dashboard Widget — “Rank Bix SEO Overview” panel showing SEO health status, key site statistics (Posts, Pages, Redirects, 404 Errors, Broken Links) and quick-action buttons.

Admin Toolbar menu now always visible; new “Show SEO alert badges” toggle replaces previous visibility control.

Added 308 redirect type (permanent, method-preserving) to the Redirections manager.

Settings navigation now uses URL hash for correct tab opening on page load.

AI Keys settings now document where keys are stored and offer hardening via wp-config.php.

Critical settings bug resolved — saving Duplicate Page settings no longer wipes General settings.

SEO health alerts in toolbar — red badge appears when critical issues are detected, with one-click fix links. Alerts cover: “Discourage search engines” enabled, plain permalink structure, conflicting SEO plugins, missing homepage SEO title and disabled XML sitemap.

Settings page remembers active tab across saves via sessionStorage and supports direct URL linking via hash (e.g. #advanced).

SEO score formula unified between post listing and meta box; score badge tooltip now shows all 11 checks with pass/fail status.

Dashboard stats include 404 Errors and Broken Links counts when those modules are enabled.

LLMs.txt card shows live file status indicator.

Documentation, Support and Rate Plugin links added to the plugins list row.

Google PageSpeed Insights toolbar link URL corrected to use /analysis?url=.

Tools settings UI overhaul — IndexNow, LLMs.txt, 404 Monitor and Broken Link Checker grouped with clearer labels, toggle descriptions and a manual broken link scan button.

Importer result messages now report exact counts of transferred items.

Onboarding checklist added for new users; auto-hides when all steps are complete.

AI Meta Generator — fixed “Generate Title + Description” returning only title; updated default models (Gemini 2.0 Flash, Claude Haiku 4.5, Llama 3.1); Cohere upgraded to v2 API; maxOutputTokens increased from 400 to 800.

Table of Contents — fixed auto-insert on front end and with Gutenberg content; redesigned styling with CSS variables, card shadow and responsive mobile handling.

AI generate buttons remain functional after provider selection and page reload.

Fixed layout overflow on Bulk SEO Editor on narrow screens.

Tools settings toggles now save correctly when multiple options are changed simultaneously.

IndexNow integration — auto-notifies Bing, Yandex and IndexNow-participating search engines on post/page publish or update.

LLMs.txt — serves /llms.txt describing your site to AI systems; opt-in AI crawler blocking via robots.txt.

404 Monitor — logs 404 errors to the database (up to 500 entries, auto-pruned). Shows URL, referrer, hit count and last-seen date. “+ Redirect” button pre-fills the redirections form.

Broken Link Checker — background WP-Cron job checks external links via HTTP HEAD requests. Stores up to 50 broken links.

Tools settings tab — centralises IndexNow, LLMs.txt, 404 Monitor and Broken Link Checker settings.

WordPress toolbar menu — quick links to Dashboard, Settings, Redirections, Sitemap, Bulk SEO and 404 Monitor.

Gemini API key now sent via X-Goog-Api-Key header instead of URL query parameter.

Added rate limiting (20 requests per user per hour) to the AI generation handler.

Added explicit capability check to render_duplicate_page().

XML sitemap output cached in a one-hour transient with auto-invalidation on publish.

AI provider model list loaded lazily via AJAX when the AI tab opens, removing up to four blocking HTTP requests.

Duplicate Page title prefix/suffix settings now take effect correctly.

SEO title & meta description with template variables (%post_title%, %site_name%, %sep% and more).

Open Graph & Twitter Cards with per-post social image overrides.

XML & HTML Sitemap u2014 auto-generated, cached, supports Google News sitemap and image entries.

Schema / JSON-LD u2014 Article, Product, Review, HowTo, FAQ, BreadcrumbList, LocalBusiness u2014 generated automatically.

Keyword analysis and 15-point live SEO scoring in the WordPress post editor.

Image SEO u2014 auto-fills missing alt text and title attributes.

Breadcrumbs shortcode and template function with BreadcrumbList structured data.

Duplicate Page u2014 clone posts, pages and custom post types with all SEO meta preserved.

Redirections u2014 301 / 302 / 307 with CSV import/export and hit counter.

Bulk SEO Editor u2014 edit titles, descriptions and focus keywords across all posts in one screen.

AI Meta Generator u2014 generate titles and descriptions with your own OpenAI, Claude, Gemini, Groq or Cohere API key.

Table of Contents with smooth scroll, shortcode and auto-insert.

Custom robots.txt rules and custom canonical URLs.

One-click importer from Yoast SEO, Rank Math and All in One SEO.