ShowBits

ShowBits turns podcast and TV episodes into short clips, subtitles and quote cards, and your editors approve them there. This plugin connects your WordPress site to a ShowBits workspace and brings what your editors released into the media library, ready for posts and pages.

You need a ShowBits workspace to use this plugin (ShowBits Cloud on any plan, or a ShowBits OnPremise installation). The plugin is the connector; the clips and quote cards come from ShowBits. See “External services” below for what is exchanged with ShowBits.

What it does

• Media → ShowBits lists the released clips and quote cards of the connected workspace, newest first, with search and a filter. Pick some and import them.
• A clip arrives as an MP4 video, with its thumbnail as the poster image. A quote card arrives as a picture in 4:5, 1:1 or 9:16, with the quote as alternative text.
• Admins and owners in ShowBits can also send a released clip to the site; it lands in the media library by itself.
• Nothing leaves ShowBits before the episode’s embargo ends, and only released clips at all: ShowBits checks this for every file.
• Imported files are ordinary WordPress attachments. They stay when a clip changes in ShowBits; importing a new version adds a new attachment, so posts that show the old one do not break.
• Everyone who may upload media can use the library; people who manage the site connect it.

Connecting

In ShowBits, an admin or owner of the workspace makes a site key for this site’s address (Integrations → WordPress) and passes it on. Here, under Settings → ShowBits, paste it and connect. The key is valid for 24 hours and only once. If you are an admin or owner in ShowBits yourself, you can instead connect through ShowBits: sign in there and agree (OAuth 2.1 style, with PKCE).

While connecting, ShowBits checks at this site’s REST API that it is talking to the plugin that asked, so a site key copied anywhere else connects nothing. The site then gets a key of its own that only opens this plugin’s routes in ShowBits (not ShowBits’ REST API), and a secret that ShowBits signs its pushes with. Both are stored encrypted with a key from wp-config.php (SHOWBITS_ENCRYPTION_KEY, or the site’s salts). The connection lasts until someone disconnects it in ShowBits or here.

Requirements

• A ShowBits workspace, and an admin or owner of it who makes the site key.
• The site is served over HTTPS and ShowBits can reach its REST API (/wp-json/showbits/v1/push): every file comes to the site as a push from ShowBits, also the ones picked in the library. A firewall or security plugin must let these requests through.
• WP-Cron runs for what ShowBits sends on its own (imports picked in the library finish while the page is open); a real cron job calling wp-cron.php is best.

For developers

• showbits_capability – who may browse and import (default upload_files).
• showbits_menu_label – the name in the menus (default “ShowBits”).
• showbits_allow_private_media – allow downloading from a media store on a private network (OnPremise).
• showbits_max_download_bytes – the largest file to download (default 2 GB).
• SHOWBITS_ENCRYPTION_KEY in wp-config.php – the key for the stored secrets, instead of one derived from the salts.

External services

This plugin connects to ShowBits, a video clipping service by HBC Hohn Business Consulting UG (haftungsbeschränkt), Berlin, Germany. It needs ShowBits to list and deliver your workspace’s clips and quote cards; without a connection it does nothing. By default it talks to ShowBits Cloud at https://app.showbits.ai. With ShowBits OnPremise, an administrator enters the address of that installation before connecting, and all of the following goes there instead.

What is sent, and when:

• When an administrator connects the site (Settings → ShowBits): the site key, the site’s address and title, the address of the plugin’s REST route, the plugin’s version and a random one-time value. With “Connect through ShowBits”, the administrator’s browser goes to ShowBits’ consent page with the site’s address and title, the address to come back to and a PKCE challenge. ShowBits then sends one check to the site’s REST route.
• On the settings page: the connection’s status (workspace name, imports today), asked at most every five minutes.
• On Media → ShowBits: the search term, filter and page of the library. Your browser loads the preview pictures from ShowBits through short-lived links.
• When a clip is imported (picked in the library, or sent from ShowBits): the clip’s id and format; then the plugin downloads the files from the short-lived link ShowBits returns, and tells ShowBits whether the import worked, with the attachment’s address in the media library or the reason it failed.
• When the site is disconnected, or the plugin is deleted: a request that ends the connection in ShowBits.

Once connected, requests to ShowBits carry the site’s own key; file downloads go without it. Nothing is sent about the site’s visitors, and the plugin adds nothing to the public site.

• ShowBits terms of service: https://showbits.ai/en/terms
• ShowBits privacy policy (section “WordPress (ShowBits plugin)”): https://showbits.ai/en/privacy#wordpress