Using media-upload.php - requires user to have edit_posts capability?

Question

I'm integrating an image upload action, on the options page for my plugin.

It works, but the thickbox dialog sits with a message "crunching" and never completes. Checking the console in Firebug shows that the error message "you are not allowed to edit this item" is being returned.

I can get past the error by add_cap("edit_posts") to the user's role -- but I really cannot do that since it opens up too many other privileges in Admin.

So, how does one use media-upload to simply upload an image and get back the resulting URL -- without media-upload thinking that the user needs edit_posts capability? The call to the uploader from jQuery click event looks like this:

tb_show('Upload a Image', 'media-upload.php?referer=media_page&type=image&TB_iframe=true&post_id=0', false);

Answer 1

The solution to this is pretty ugly. First, I am going to have to create all posts in this system starting at a high ID number (say, 10000). I'll have to do this via wp_insert_post with the "import_id" suggestion. That will move all the content I don't want the user to be able to touch, to a safe range.

Then, using the method described here: http://mawaha.com/allow-user-to-edit-specific-post-using-map_meta_cap/

map the meta capability for "edit_post", when post number is less than 10000.

It works, but man I wish WP allowed a capability filter to be added to the media handler :-(