Custom Taxonomy – Related Posts Query

I was just suggesting hardcoding for testing. The code assumes an array – how that array is populated (statically or dynamically) doesn’t matter. To get them dynamically you could use one of the strategies above, for example:

$terms = get_the_terms( $post->ID , 'badge', 'string');

(in that case, you would use this as the top of the foreach function:

foreach($terms as $term){
$term_name = $term->slug;
....

How you set up the $terms array beforehand is totally up to you. Good luck ??

I’m sorry but I think the fatigue has taken a toll on my comprehension skills… I can’t wrap my head around this. Would you mind posting an example of the entire loop?

I know its a lot to ask but i’m loosing my head over this ??

It’s untested, so there may well be typos/errors/other issues, but this is the main idea. The presumption is that we’re working with a $post and that we’re finding other posts in the same custom taxonomy tag set.

$global $post;

//Get the terms for the current post
$terms = get_the_terms( $post->ID , 'badge', 'string');

$potentials = array();
$c = 0;
$totalFound = 0;

//Gather your posts for each term
foreach($terms as $term_name){
   $q = array(
	'my_custom_tax' => $term_name, //term to retrieve from custom taxonomy
	'numberposts' => 4,  //limit to 4 posts
	'post_type' => 'post', //get only posts
	'exclude' => $post->ID //exclude current post
   );
   $posts = get_posts($q);
   $totalFound+= count($posts);
   $potentials[$c++] = array_reverse($posts); //reverse the array so 'pop' grabs the 'first' element
}

$count = 0;  //The number of good posts we've found
$index = 0;  //Number of posts we've tried
$max = $totalFound > 4 ? 4 : $totalFound;  //The max we can find
$posts = array();

//Now pick one post from each term until we reach our quota,
//or have checked them all
while($count < $max){

  //Pop off a post to use
  $rpost = array_pop($potentials[$index++]);

  //if we got a post (if there was one left)
  if($rpost){
    //don't take duplicates
    if(!isset($posts[$rpost->ID])){
      $posts[$rpost->ID] = $rpost;
      $count++;
    }
  }
  $index = ($index % 4); //rotate through the 4 term arrays
}
foreach($posts as $rpost){
  //print your related posts
  echo '<h3>'.$rpost->post_title.'</h3>';
  echo '<div>'.$rpost->post_excerpt.'</h3>';
}

Ok,

This generates a few errors : preg_split() expects parameter 2 to be string, array given

and then lists the 4 latest posts.

Forgot to integrate the term term_name issue

$global $post;

//Get the terms for the current post
$terms = get_the_terms( $post->ID , 'badge', 'string');

$potentials = array();
$c = 0;
$totalFound = 0;

//Gather your posts for each term
foreach($terms as $term){     //changed to $term
   $term_name = $term->slug;  //new
   $q = array(
	'my_custom_tax' => $term_name, //term to retrieve from custom taxonomy
	'numberposts' => 4,  //limit to 4 posts
	'post_type' => 'post', //get only posts
	'exclude' => $post->ID //exclude current post
   );
   $posts = get_posts($q);
   $totalFound+= count($posts);
   $potentials[$c++] = array_reverse($posts); //reverse the array so 'pop' grabs the 'first' element
}

$count = 0;  //The number of good posts we've found
$index = 0;  //Number of posts we've tried
$max = $totalFound > 4 ? 4 : $totalFound;  //The max we can find
$posts = array();

//Now pick one post from each term until we reach our quota,
//or have checked them all
while($count < $max){

  //Pop off a post to use
  $rpost = array_pop($potentials[$index++]);

  //if we got a post (if there was one left)
  if($rpost){
    //don't take duplicates
    if(!isset($posts[$rpost->ID])){
      $posts[$rpost->ID] = $rpost;
      $count++;
    }
  }
  $index = ($index % 4); //rotate through the 4 term arrays
}
foreach($posts as $rpost){
  //print your related posts
  echo '<h3>'.$rpost->post_title.'</h3>';
  echo '<div>'.$rpost->post_excerpt.'</h3>';
}

So this is exactly what i put into my page, and all I get is the last 4 posts published on the blog.

[Code moderated as per the Forum Rules. Please use the pastebin]

If I replace ‘Brands’ with ‘brands’ I get :
Warning: array_pop() [function.array-pop]: The argument should be an array in

This error message displays once for every term associated to the current post (in my case, 6 times) and is then followed by the last 4 posts published on the blog.

Does this make any sense?

1. the code you posted still uses ‘my_custom_tax’ – it should be “brands” or “Brands” or whatnot (that’s where I assume the lowercase version would be better, but I don’t know, it depends on your code. Usually slugs are lower-case).

2. Yeah, the code assumes there are only 4 terms applied to the current post. If your current post has 6 terms, this code will fail the way it currently works. For the purposes of this example, you can truncate the array like this:

//Get the terms for the current post
$terms = get_the_terms( $post->ID , 'Brands', 'string');
$terms = array_splice($terms, 4);

To make it work for all cases, instead of truncating the array I *think* all you’d need to change is:

$index = ($index % 4); //rotate through the 4 term arrays
to

$index = ($index % count($terms)); //rotate through the n term arrays

[Please post code snippets between backticks or use the code button.]

OMG Your a GENIUS!

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!!!!

I’m going to relay the info to all the others who have been desperately looking for this kind of solution.

Thanks again ??

Haha glad we got it sorted ??

Ok so i’ve got one last one, but this shouldn’t be too hard… considering ??

I’d like to display the post’s thumbnails using the_post_thumbnail();

But after testing my method it just displays the current post’s thumbnail 4 times instead of the related post’s thumbs…

How about

echo get_the_post_thumbnail( $rpost->ID );
The the_post_thumbnail function uses the global post variable. In the loop we can pass the ID of the individual posts to the get version.

[Please post code snippets between backticks or use the code button.]

Ah right! Perfect!

So I’ve been testing this script and its working as it should but there are a few cases where I don’t understand what is happening.

Ignored terms
Some terms are ignored all together. For instance the ‘Brand’ (taxonomy) term with the most associated posts never gets pulled into the results.

No results displayed
If my custom post type has several terms associated with it, but only one of these terms is associated to posts, then nothing shows up.

I noticed that if I changed $terms = array_splice($terms, 4); to $terms = array_splice($terms, 1); for example, it displays posts but only from one brand…

Posts from a single brand only
An other problem I noticed is that posts from a single brand are displayed (in some cases) even if there are several terms associated with it and each of these terms have posts as well.

Now this is weird behaviour, I don’t get why its doing that.

Any ideas?