Coolfields Consulting www.coolfields.co.uk@coolfields

Obscure WordPress Functions that are actually quite useful…Graham ArmfieldWeb Accessibility ConsultantWordPress Developer

graham.armfield@coolfields.co.uk@coolfields

2

Obscure? Really?

Well, maybe not known to everyone…

3

Formatting textwpautop($str);

• Adds in line breaks and paragraphs

• Useful for printing textarea custom fields

4

Formatting textBut… sometimes wpautop() goes too far

• Adds in empty paragraphs• <div> elements in paragraphs• Often happens when using shortcodes• Can be down to the order that things get

done

5

Removing empty paragraphsremove_filter( 'the_content', 'wpautop' );add_filter( 'the_content', 'wpautop' , 99);

function remove_empty_p($content){ $content = force_balance_tags($content); return preg_replace('#<p>\s*+(<br\s*/*>)?\s*</p>#i', '', $content);}add_filter('the_content', 'remove_empty_p', 20, 1);

6

More on shortcodesAllow shortcodes to be interpreted in widgets:

add_filter('widget_text', 'do_shortcode');

Remove all shortcodes from a string:

strip_shortcodes( $content );

7

ExcerptsThe default length is 55 words.

You can change this…

function custom_excerpt_length( $length ) {return 30;

}add_filter( 'excerpt_length', custom_excerpt_length', 999 );

8

Localizing datesPost/page published dates get localized automatically by WP when site's language changes.

But, what if you have to set date formats in PHP?

9

Localizing datesEg: Custom fields may have date in database format: 2016-02-25

This is useful for sorting, and selecting using wp_query();

You may need to output: 25 Chwefror 2016

10

Localizing datesSetting the locale in PHP can be a pain.

So use the WordPress capability instead –

date_i18n($pattern, $timestamp);

11

Localizing datesfunction db_date_format($str_date, $pattern = ''){ // incoming format = yyyy-mm-dd if (empty($pattern)) { $pattern = get_option( 'date_format' ); }

$time_stamp = mktime(0,0,0,substr($str_date,5,2), substr ($str_date,8,2),substr($str_date,0,4));

return date_i18n( $pattern, $time_stamp );}

12

PaginationOn blog index pages, using previous_posts_link() and next_posts_link() is OK…

But it doesn't give site visitors an indication of how many blog posts there are altogether.

Pagination may give better usability…

13

Paginationglobal $wp_query;

if ($wp_query->max_num_pages > 1) { $big = 999999999; // need an unlikely integer echo paginate_links( array( 'base' => str_replace( $big, '%#%', esc_url( get_pagenum_link($big) ) ), 'format' => '?paged=%#%', 'current' => max( 1, get_query_var('paged') ), 'total' => $wp_query->max_num_pages, 'end_size' => 3, 'type' => 'list', 'prev_text' => '&laquo; Newer<span class="srdr"> posts</span>', 'next_text' => 'Older<span class="srdr"> posts</span> &raquo;', 'before_page_number' => '<span class="srdr">Page </span>', 'after_page_number' => '' ) );}

Can use this with custom queries too.

14

Thanks for listening

graham.armfield@coolfields.co.uk@coolfields