sorting a loop by two keys

I looked into this, and surprisingly it’s not easy to order by multiple custom fields. The [loop] uses WP_Query and there’s no simple way to accomplish it unfortunately. The solutions I found were either: get posts ordered by one field, then manually (in PHP) sort them by a second field; or, filter the database query using post_order – which is not a documented method and may not work in old (or future) versions of WordPress..

If you don’t have so many books in the list yet, maybe there’s a way to structure the content differently so that the books can be related by prizes easier – for example, what if the prizes was a custom taxonomy..?

Or, another idea.. The [pass] shortcode has a parameter called list, which can be used to pass any list of items. So, perhaps it’s possible to go through a list of prizes, and if the current post has that prize, to list other books with that prize, ordered by year. Something like..

[pass list="Nobel, Man Booker, etc."]
  [if field="prize_1" value="{ITEM}"]
    Other books with {ITEM} prize
    [loop taxonomy="category" term="books" field="prize_1" value="{ITEM}" exclude="this" orderby="field_num" key="year_1" order="desc"]
      [field title-link]..
    [/loop]
  [/if]
[/pass]

Hmm..no, this will be the same as your code – it will need to check the second field for the same prize, and that would be listed after the first..

Tough question. I still think there may be a different way to structure the data to make this possible somehow.. The only other solution I can think of, is to use PHP to gather the related books and manually sort them.

I have a somewhat different case involving to sort for more than one key. My articles are about biblical passages, so each is attached to a biblical reference. I store it in four custom fields (book, chapter, initial_verse, final_verse). I want to sort the loop by chapter, then by initial_verse, then by final_verse. The output must be like

Matthew 1:1-18
Matthew 1:19-25
Matthew 3:14-16
Matthew 3:17-21

Etc. Chapter, initial_verse and final_verse, in just one loop instruction. I wonder what is the better way to accomplish this.

https://biblicomentarios.com

Hello,

I looked for more information about sorting by multiple fields. There’s a method I came across that has worked for several people, so I’ll try to include it in the next update and let you know.

Is the method already included?

Hi. I need sorting by two fields too. In my case I want to sort my posts by “date” OR “comment-date”, in other words I want to sort posts by comment-date, but if I have a NEW post – it must be on top of list.

PS: Thanks for wonderful plugin! =)

If someone is still interested in sorting by two keys, I have a solution which works almost perfectly for me.

I store values (prizes, years of prizes) in separate custom fields for a page with a book:
prize_1 – year_1
prize_2 – year_2
prize_3 – year_3 etc.

and in a single custom field for a page with a literary award:
prize.

I create three (or more) loops which output the data in a form of a table.
<table style=”width:100%” class=”tablesorter”>
<thead>
<tr>
<th>Year</th>
<th>Author</th>
<th>Title</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody>
[pass field=prize]
[loop type=books field=prize_1 value={FIELD}]
<tr>
<td>[field year_1]</td>
<td>[field author]</td>
<td>[field title]</td>
</tr>
[/loop]
[loop type=books field=prize_2 value={FIELD}]
<tr>
<td>[field year_2]</td>
<td>[field author]</td>
<td>[field title]</td>
</tr>
[/loop]
[loop type=books field=prize_3 value={FIELD}]
<tr>
<td>[field year_3]</td>
<td>[field author]</td>
<td>[field title]</td>
</tr>
[/loop]
[/pass]
</tbody>
</table>

Then I use the “Table Sorter” plugin, which allows to make the table sortable (by simply adding the “tablesorter” class to the table).

It suits my needs even better then sorting it in a backend, beacause I want my users to be able to sort by a key of their choice.

I’m not sure it’s exactly what you needed, by my problem is more or less solved.
Thanks for your help anyway!

In the newest update v3.3.0, I added a feature for sorting by multiple fields. WP_Query doesn’t have this feature, so it was a tricky solution. Custom and default fields are supported, except *comment-date*, *rand*, *menu*, *parent*.

[loop type=post orderby=field_1 orderby_2=field_2 orderby_3=field_3]