Custom feature image upload from front end only uploads folder name - php

Question

thanks for taking a look at my question.
The Problem
I need to be able to an upload feature image(thumbnail) that is associated with a post, the website that is being worked on has the ability to make posts from the front-end of the website.
Custom code implemented
in the post submission form I'm using a input element of type file:
<form class="compose-post-form" method="POST" enctype="multipart/form-data">
...
<input type="file" name="featured" id="featured">
...
</form>
The data is being sent to the backend on form submit with jQuery AJAX:
$.ajax({
type: 'post',
url: t_ajax_url.ajax_url,
data: $this.serialize() + "&tri_post_content="+article_content+"&article="+article,
beforeSend: function () {
is_sending = true;
},
success: function (data) {
//window.location.replace(get_homepage_url+'trisine');
var fd = new FormData();
var file = $('#featured').val();
fd.append("featured", file);
fd.append('action', 'thumbnail_up');
jQuery.ajax({
type: 'POST',
url: t_ajax_url.ajax_url,
data: fd,
contentType: false,
processData: false,
success: function(response){
console.log(response);
}
});
},
error: function(xhr, status, error) {
console.log(status);
}
});
This is the code that saves the thumbnail, for now I'm just testing with a post ID of 22:
add_action( 'wp_ajax_thumbnail_up', 't_thumbnail_up' );
function t_thumbnail_up(){
$uploaddir = wp_upload_dir();
$file = $_FILE['featured'];
$uploadfile = $uploaddir['path'] . '/' . basename( $file['name'] );
move_uploaded_file( $file['tmp_name'] , $uploadfile );
$filename = basename( $uploadfile );
$wp_filetype = wp_check_filetype(basename($filename), null );
$attachment = array(
'post_mime_type' => $wp_filetype['type'],
'post_title' => preg_replace('/\.[^.]+$/', '', $filename),
'post_content' => '',
'post_status' => 'inherit',
'menu_order' => $_i + 1000
);
$attach_id = wp_insert_attachment( $attachment, $uploadfile );
update_post_meta(22, '_thumbnail_id',$attach_id);
set_post_thumbnail( 22, $thumbnail_id );
exit();
}
The results are that something get's uploaded but it seems to only be the folders name, which is November's month number, the folder isn't actually created on the server:
Any help on how I can get this to work will be highly appreciated.

Answer 1

Use this functions to handle files from ajax.
<?php
$thumbnail = $_FILES[ 'featured' ];
$thumbnail_id = media_handle_sideload( $thumbnail, $post_id );
set_post_thumbnail( $post_id, $screenshot_id );