MCP Abilities - Formidable

Formidable Forms abilities for MCP. Inspect forms, styles, settings, usage, and CSS cache/runtime behavior.

Tested up to: 7.0 Stable tag: 1.2.9 License: GPLv2 or later License URI: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html

What It Does

Formidable Forms abilities for MCP. Inspect forms, styles, settings, usage, and CSS cache/runtime behavior.

This plugin is part of the MCP abilities ecosystem. It gives an MCP-capable agent a focused, authenticated way to work with Formidable work inside WordPress through MCP.

Example: "Handle this WordPress maintenance task directly." - The agent can inspect the site, call the relevant ability, and return the result without making the human click through wp-admin for every step.

The Real Workflow

In practice, the human should not have to memorize every ability name.

The normal pattern is:

1. install the base MCP stack
2. install only the add-ons the site actually needs
3. let the agent discover the available abilities
4. give the agent a clear task with boundaries
5. verify the result in WordPress

The human's job is mostly to describe the goal. The agent's job is to figure out the mechanics.

Why This Feels Different

Most WordPress automation still leaves the repetitive part to the human.

This plugin is different because the agent can act inside the site through a narrow, authenticated ability surface:

• inspect current site state before changing anything
• run the specific action needed for the task
• return structured results that are easy to verify
• keep the workflow inside WordPress instead of a separate checklist

That changes the experience from:

• Here is what you should do in wp-admin

to:

• Tell the agent what needs doing, and let it carry out the work

Before vs After

Before

• ask the AI what to do
• copy the answer into WordPress by hand
• click through wp-admin for the repetitive bits
• postpone maintenance because the task is tedious

After

• tell the agent what needs doing
• let it inspect the relevant WordPress state
• let it run the targeted ability
• verify the result and move on

Who It Is For

This is a good fit for:

• agencies managing WordPress sites with AI-assisted maintenance
• operators who want agents to do real WordPress work instead of producing instructions
• teams already using MCP Expose Abilities
• sites where this WordPress area is updated often enough to deserve automation

It is especially useful when the manual version is repetitive enough that important maintenance gets delayed.

Documentation

Start with the main plugin page and base stack documentation:

• MCP Expose Abilities
• Plugin page
• Getting Started
• Install Order and Dependencies

If you are using an AI agent, the simplest instruction is often just:

• Read https://github.com/bjornfix/mcp-expose-abilities and figure out the stack before making changes.

Start Here

If you are new to the stack, use this order:

1. Install Abilities API.
2. Install MCP Adapter.
3. Install MCP Expose Abilities.
4. Install MCP Abilities - Formidable.
5. Confirm the new abilities appear in discovery.
6. Give the agent a clear task that uses this add-on.

If you skip base-stack verification and start with add-ons immediately, troubleshooting gets harder than it needs to be.

Abilities (15)

Ability	Description
formidable/get-settings	Get effective and raw Formidable settings
formidable/update-settings	Update supported runtime and style settings
formidable/list-forms	List forms with IDs, keys, styles, and shortcode refs
formidable/get-form	Get one form with normalized options and optional fields
formidable/clone-form	Clone a form, its fields, and its form actions
formidable/update-form	Update form properties and native form options
formidable/list-fields	List normalized fields for a form
formidable/get-field	Get one normalized field by ID
formidable/create-field	Create a new field, including file upload fields
formidable/update-field	Update an existing field, including file upload settings
formidable/update-action	Update a form action using structured settings
formidable/update-post-meta	Update permitted metadata on a related WordPress post
formidable/list-styles	List saved Formidable styles
formidable/find-form-usage	Find post, widget, and Elementor usage of a form
formidable/clear-css-cache	Clear and optionally rebuild generated CSS

Notes

• load_style supports all, dynamic, and none
• find-form-usage currently inspects:
  • post content
  • Elementor _elementor_data
  • widget_frm_show_form
• clear-css-cache clears the common Formidable CSS/settings transients and can rebuild generated CSS when Formidable style classes are available

Changelog

1.2.9

• Added native options merge support to formidable/update-form for targeted Formidable form setting updates.
• Clear Formidable form and field runtime caches after form updates.

1.2.8

• Use Formidable's native field update path for formidable/update-field so file upload settings run Formidable filters and clear form field transients.
• Clear Formidable field runtime caches after field updates.

1.2.7

• Added explicit file upload field aliases for max_file_size_mb, min_file_size_mb, and max_files_per_entry.
• Added normalized file field output for the same file upload limits.

1.2.6

• Replace interpolated Formidable table SQL with prepared identifier placeholders.
• Update tested WordPress version metadata for Plugin Check.
• Align public release identity with the Basicus author/contributor rule.

1.2.5

• Added formidable/get-form, formidable/list-fields, formidable/get-field, formidable/create-field, and formidable/update-field
• Added form cloning, form updates, post-meta updates, and action update abilities
• Added normalized form/field helpers and Formidable-table read fallbacks for safer MCP inspection
• Expanded the plugin so MCP clients can create and update file upload fields directly

1.1.0

• Internal release superseded by 1.2.5 before public package publication

1.0.4

• Docs: expanded the WordPress-standard readme.txt so the published ZIP now includes fuller requirements, abilities, use cases, and Devenia ecosystem links

1.0.3

• Moved the remaining abilities onto the core site category for compatibility with the current Abilities API registry behavior

1.0.2

• Fixed missing text domains in translated strings for plugin-check compliance

1.0.1

• Fixed registration to run on wp_abilities_api_init
• Added the content ability category before registering content-related abilities

1.0.0

• Initial release
• Added formidable/get-settings
• Added formidable/update-settings
• Added formidable/list-forms
• Added formidable/list-styles
• Added formidable/find-form-usage
• Added formidable/clear-css-cache

Contributing

PRs welcome. Keep changes focused on the plugin's WordPress ability surface and preserve authenticated, explicit workflows.

License

GPL-2.0+

Author

basicus

Links

• Plugin Page
• MCP Expose Abilities
• GitHub Releases

Star and Share

If this plugin saves you time or makes WordPress maintenance easier to verify, please:

• star the repo
• share it with people running WordPress sites
• point them to the main plugin page so they can see what the ecosystem can actually do

Why do it?

Because agent-friendly open WordPress tooling helps more of the boring but important work get done.