Relocate WordPress File Upload section

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Last week I posted an email to the wp-hackers list asking why in the infinite wisdom of the developers doesn’t the File Upload area on the Posts and Pages editor follow the same functionality as the Custom Fields, Post Excerpt. My point is the File Upload section is huge and take up a lot of screen. Screen area that is not used for every post. The reply from the group was other plugins that will remove the File Upload area entirely. Not really what I wanted. There was a whole other thread on how questions like this should be directed to the WordPress community forums and not the wp-hackers list. But that is a whole other rant.

So I started looking into this. And decided to sit down and fix this. Download the plugin here.

This plugin has been tested on WordPress 2.0.2 – 2.0.5. Have not tested on 2.1beta versions. That will be soon.

development note

The plugin performs two functions:

  1. When the admin user loads the Posts or Page editor a new ‘box’ is created at the bottom of the chain. This box is a place holder for the second step.
  2. When the page loads JavaScript code is added to the HTML head. This JavaScript will call ‘getElementById()’ to find the reference to the iframe ID of the File Upload section and the reference ID for the new ‘box’ created in step 1. Once the IDs are found the next ste is to call thhe JavaScript function ‘appendChild()’ to append the File Upload reference to the new ‘box’. Simple as that.

Installation Instruction

Pretty standard WordPress plugin installation.

  1. Download the plugin here..
  2. The downloaded file is zipped. As the plugin needs to be unzipped to function you can unzip before or after sending this to your server. Upload the plugin file to your WordPress site into the /wp-content/plugins folder.
  3. Signin to your WordPress admin interface. Navigate to the Plugins Management page and Activate the ‘Relocate File Upload’ plugin.
  4. That should be it. Now go to either the Posts or Pages editor screens and see if the File Upload section has been moved to the bottom of the boxes. You should now be able to collapse and expand the section, rearrange the boxes.
  5. If anyone has problems with this plugin please email me.