Tips & Tricks
Turn your RSS feed into a shortcode
Last week I wrote how to “Use WordPress to print a RSS feed for Eventbrite attendees“. It was pretty popular, but then I found myself in a place that was more annoying. Trying to incorporate that into a blog post or page.
Without having to download a plugin that will allow PHP to be executed inside a post, I would have to create a template file and use that. Which is what I did, and it works just fine. But for some reason I forgot all about shortcodes! With a shortcode, I could generate all the PHP in the functions file and then just call the shortcode when/where I want.
Okay, so lets show the completed PHP code:
function attendee_feed_print_2009() { global $wpdb; include_once( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/rss.php' ); $rss = fetch_rss( 'http://www.eventbrite.com/rss/event_list_attendees/384870157' ); $items = array_slice( $rss->items, 0 ); if ( empty( $items ) ) echo '<ul style="list-style-type: none; list-style-image: none; list-style-position: outside;"><li>No items</li></ul>'; else foreach ( $items as $item ) : ?> <ul style="list-style-type:none; list-style-image:none; list-style-position:outside; margin-bottom: 0px"> <li><!--<strong><?php echo $item[ 'title' ]; //User name ?></strong><br />--> <?php echo $item[ 'content' ][ 'encoded' ]; ?> <hr style="border: 1px solid #ddd; margin-bottom: 8px" /> </li> </ul> <?php endforeach; }
Now, this code has to be changed for it to work as a shortcode. We’ll have to return the function and not print/echo it.
I also wanted to be able to use multiple instances of the code with different feeds. To do so I had to create a argument to extract from the completed short code. I found a demo at: Alex Mansfield’s post.
Remember this:
function attendee_feed_print_2009() { global $wpdb; include_once( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/rss.php' ); $rss = fetch_rss( 'http://www.eventbrite.com/rss/event_list_attendees/384870157' );
We are going to update it to read as follows ( changes in bold ) :
function attendee_feed_print_2009( $rss_nbr ) { global $wpdb; extract( shortcode_atts( array( 'rss' => ''), $rss_nbr ) ); include_once( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/rss.php' ); $rss = fetch_rss( $rss );
And the final code with the fields updated to return the arguments ( put into your functions.php file ( in between <?php
?>
) ) :
function attendee_feed_print_2009( $rss_nbr ) { global $wpdb; extract( shortcode_atts( array( 'rss' => ''), $rss_nbr ) ); include_once( ABSPATH . WPINC . '/rss.php' ); $rss = fetch_rss( $rss ); $items = array_slice( $rss->items, 0 ); $rss_html = '<div id="eventbrite-attendee-list" style="clear:both;">'; if ( empty( $items ) ) $rss_html .= '<ul style="list-style:none;"><li>No attendees, yet.</li></ul>'; else foreach ( $items as $item ) : $rss_html .= '<ul style="background:none; list-style:none; margin:0px">'; $rss_html .= '<li style="background:none; list-style:none;">'; $rss_html .= $item[ 'content' ][ 'encoded' ]; $rss_html .= '<hr style="border: 1px solid #ddd; margin-bottom: 10px" />'; $rss_html .= '</li>'; $rss_html .= '</ul>'; endforeach; $rss_html .= '</div>'; return $rss_html; }
And lets not forget to add the shortcode function!
add_shortcode( 'eventbrite-attendees', 'attendee_feed_print_2009' );
Final outcome with look like this `[eventbrite-attendees rss="http://your-rss-feed.com/"]`
I’ve created this into a plugin!
Download the plugin: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/eventbrite-attendees-shortcode/
Tips & Tricks
Can′t add pagination on WooThemes Thick Theme
Everything I have tried has led to nothing. And I have tried six way’s from Sunday to get my main posts to paginate.
example one:
<?php $paged = (get_query_var('paged')) ? get_query_var('paged') : 1; query_posts('offset=1&showposts=' . get_option('woo_other_entries') . '&cat=-' . $GLOBALS['ex_asides'] . '&paged=$paged' ); ?>
example two:
<?php global $myOffset; global $wp_query; $myOffset = 1; $paged = intval(get_query_var('paged')) ? get_query_var('paged') : 1; $temp = $wp_query; $wp_query= null; $wp_query = new WP_Query(); $wp_query->query(array( 'offset' => $myOffset, 'category__not_in' => array($GLOBALS['ex_asides'],7,84), 'paged' => $paged, 'showposts' => get_option('woo_other_entries'), )); ?>
example three:
<?php global $myOffset; $myOffset = 1; $wp_query = new WP_Query(); $wp_query->query(array( 'offset' => $myOffset, 'category__not_in' => array($GLOBALS['ex_asides'],7,84), 'paged' => $paged, 'showposts' => get_option('woo_other_entries'), )); ?>
And after those tries, I just can’t get more pages beyond the option’s that I choose, and can only pull an archive via the browse more link.
Any suggestions or anything?
Tips & Tricks
Pulling custom fields from outside the loop
In the last post “Creating a custom widget” I showed you how to create a custom widget. Well in this post I will show you how I used my custom widget to display all post with a certain custom field from outside the WordPress loop.
In the last post I used this tag:
<?php include(TEMPLATEPATH . '/includes/showcase.php'); ?>
Now I will show you what the file showcase.php
has:
<ul> <?php global $wpdb; $sql = "SELECT wposts.* FROM $wpdb->posts wposts, $wpdb->postmeta wpostmeta WHERE wposts.ID = wpostmeta.post_id AND wpostmeta.meta_key = 'gallery-url' AND wposts.post_status = 'publish' AND wposts.post_type = 'post' ORDER BY wposts.post_date DESC LIMIT 8"; $pageposts = $wpdb->get_results($sql, OBJECT); $output = $pre_HTML; foreach ($pageposts as $post) : setup_postdata($post); ?> <li><a href="<?php echo get_post_meta($post->ID, "gallery-url", $single = true); ?>" title="Link to <?php the_title(); ?>"> <img src="<?php echo get_post_meta($post->ID, "image", $single = true); ?>" alt="<?php the_title(); ?>" /></a></li> <?php endforeach; ?> </ul>
That’s it! The most important item you may want to change for your own custom field is the line : AND wpostmeta.meta_key = 'gallery-url'
. Where you would change the text in bold to match your own custom field value.
Update:
Check out Austin from PressedWords comment below.
With his great advise I was able to figure out why all my attempts to use the query_post weren’t working. it came down to this line of code: <?php echo get_post_meta($post->ID, "gallery-url", $single = true); ?>
, that was what I had in my code, and the $post->ID
is the reason my code would not echo or print the custom field’s value. Solution? replace $post->ID
with get_the_ID()
. HA, so simple.
Tips & Tricks
Creating a custom widget
Today let’s learn a simple quick trick on how to create a custom widget. For my example I will show you how I created my Showcase widget located in the middle, to the right of the posts.
First under your functions.php
file type in the following:
<?php // Custom Widget function MyCustomWidget() { ?> <li class="widget"> <h2 class="heading">Latest Showcase</h2> <ul> <?php include(TEMPLATEPATH . '/includes/showcase.php'); ?> </ul> </li> <?php } register_sidebar_widget('The Custom Widget for Showcase', 'MyCustomWidget'); ?>
- Always make sure your code is between the
<?php
and?>
for it to work. - Once we call the function, the rest is assuming html code that you may or may not need.
- For instance, you may just put in a picture and call it a day. But my code starts with
<li<
because my sidebar’s start and end with<ul<
. - Any way, once your done, just set the final “
register_sidebar_widget('the widget title', 'the name of the function');
“
That’s it! Now you have a custom widget with what ever you want!
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Alex Mansfield
August 5, 2009 at 10:47 pm
Nice post. I’m glad you found my shortcode tutorial helpful!
.-= Alex Mansfield´s last blog ..Adding Custom WordPress Shortcodes =-.
Berg
August 10, 2009 at 2:35 am
Hey, thanks for the code.
Austin
August 10, 2009 at 10:50 am
Check out the plugin!! Eventbrite Attendee Shortcode
jon
August 25, 2009 at 10:23 pm
thanks for the code.
Auctions
September 1, 2009 at 10:05 pm
Thanks for this code… I will try this….Great informative article…
Arveno
September 20, 2009 at 8:55 am
Works great. I appreciate!
John Zitto
September 22, 2009 at 12:55 pm
Thanks! This code is useful to me!