TDO Mini Forms Alternatives: User Submitted Content in WordPress

Disclosure: Your support helps keep the site running! We earn a referral fee for some of the services we recommend on this page. Learn more

User generated content is a great way to build a website or an online business. Instead of having to write all the content yourself, or pay someone to create it, users become both the consumers and producers of content. In addition to the benefit of simply having more content for free, users who generate content are also likely to promote their content — which means free publicity for your site.

TDO Mini Forms and User Generated Content

TDO Mini Forms was a popular WordPress plugin that allowed users to easily submit posts from the front-end of a WordPress site. It could be used for other types of forms (contact forms, registration forms), but this was its primary purpose. This is what made it different from other popular form plugins like Contact Form 7. TDO Mini Forms even let you charge users for submitting content, through an integration with Paypal.

What Happened to TDO Mini Forms?

In early 2012, a security flaw was discovered in TDO Mini Forms. Sites using the plugin started to malfunction. The plugin author initially said he would fix the plugin, but the fix never came. After several WordPress releases, including a major version number change in 2014, TDO Mini Forms isn’t just insecure; it doesn’t work at all.

TDO Mini Forms Alternatives

If you are looking for a way to accept user generated content from your WordPress front-end, don’t worry. There are plenty of options for replacing TDO Mini Forms.

Plugins Similar to TDO Mini Forms

Each of these plugins provides the same core functionality as TDO Mini Forms — the ability to accept user submitted content on a WordPress site. Each one implements this a little bit differently, and none are exact replacements for TDO Mini Forms. But if you try out a few of the TDO alternatives, you’ll probably find something that works for you.

  • Gravity Forms, a premium forms tool for WordPress, can be used to allow users to submit posts from the front-end.
  • User Submitted Posts is a straight-forward plugin that lets you add a post-submission form on any page with a shortcode or widget.
  • Front-End Posting is a premium extension to the Ninja Forms plugin, allowing users to create posts, pages, or other custom post types from the front-end.
  • WP User Front-End is a plugin that lets users create, update, and delete posts, as well as edit their profile, from the WordPress front-end.
  • USP Pro is a highly customizable, premium plugin that provides a number of advanced front-end form features, including the ability for users to submit content.
  • Front-End Publishing lets users submit and edit posts, and also lets admins define editorial criteria which posts must meet, such as length and length density. Users with certain permissions can post immediately, while other user submissions can be set up in an approval queue
  • Front-end Publishing Pro is a premium plugin from CodeCanyon that allows users to create, edit, and delete posts from the front-end.
  • Frontier Post is a simple, customizable plugin that allows users to submit posts from the front-end and also lets admins and editors manage posts from the front-end.
  • AccessPress Anonymous Post Pro is a premium plugin that lets non-logged-in users (guests) submit content from the front-end. There is also a free version.

Build Your Own TDO Forms Replacement

If you want to create your own alternative to TDO Mini Forms, these tutorials will show you how to build forms that accept user submitted posts.

Conclusion

TDO Mini Forms was a great plugin that offered a much-needed feature to WordPress sites — the ability to let users add posts from the front-end. Unfortunately, it is no longer available. Even if you can find a copy of it to download (and you can, if you look), security concerns and version incompatibility make it unsafe to use.

But there are alternatives. Whether you want to use an existing plugin, or build your own front-end form, there are plenty of alternatives to TDO Mini Forms.



web hosting coupon

Looking for a great deal on WordPress hosting?
SiteGround – rated #1 by our readers – provides fast, secure WP hosting and excellent technical support. We’ve made arrangements for our readers to save up to 67% on these popular plans. Use this exclusive discount link to get the deal.



Further Reading and Resources

We have more guides, tutorials, and infographics related to coding and development:

How to Speed Up WordPress

Want to make your WordPress website lightning fast? Check out our infographic, How to Speed Up WordPress. Learn about databases, content delivery networks, and more.

Adam Michael Wood

About Adam Michael Wood

Adam specializes in developer documentation and tutorials. In addition to his writing here, he has authored engineering guides and other long-form technical manuals. Outside of work, Adam composes and performs liturgical music. He lives with his wife and children in California.

Comments

Thanks for your comment. It will show here once it has been approved.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *