Do you own a page-based WordPress website? Are you fed up with calling pages within menus? If your answer to both these questions is a "Yes" then this tutorial is for you. Here, I've used an example for explaining the process of calling pages within menus dynamically.
Is calling pages dynamically from back-end all that tedious?
No, not at all! You're not required to get into the hassles of writing any lengthy code for calling web pages(for eg: About Us, Contact Us etc.) dynamically from the WordPress back-end. Just the mere addition of a simple code snippet will do the job.
Understanding the process of calling pages within menus dynamically, using an example
WordPress comes with an in-built function "wp_list_pages($args)" for displaying the list of pages and their sub-pages. This function has an array type parameter which is used for managing the structure of pages along with their listing. Here's a look at the different parameters available for $args:
$args = array(
'authors' => '',
'child_of' => 0,
'date_format' => get_option('date_format'),
'depth' => 0,
'echo' => 1,
'exclude' => '',
'include' => '',
'link_after' => '',
'link_before' => '',
'post_type' => 'page',
'post_status' => 'publish',
'show_date' => '',
'sort_column' => 'menu_order, post_title',
'sort_order' => '',
'title_li' => __('Pages'),
'walker' => ''
);
Below is an elaboration of all the function arguments one by one:
1. authors:
argument type==>(string)
With this argument, you can include only the pages which have been authored by authors in a comma-separated list of author IDs. However, if no authors have been specified, all authors are included by default.
2. child_of:
argument type==>(integer)
This argument displays the sub-pages of a single page. It uses the ID for a page as a value. Here, you need to note that the child_of parameter will fetch "grandchildren" of the given page ID and not just the immediate children. The default value for this argument is 0, which means all pages are displayed.
3. date_format:
argument type ==> (string)
This argument controls the format of Page date set by show_date parameter(the value for this parameter can be l, F J, Y), which further defaults to the date format that has been configured in the WordPress settings options.
4. depth:
argument type==>(integer)
By using the above parameter, you can control the count for levels in the hierarchy of pages that need to go into the list generated by wp_list_pages. Different values for this parameter mean different things. Have a look at these:
0- This is the default value which means all the pages and their sub-pages will be displayed at any depth and arranged hierarchically using nested lists.
-1- This means all pages will be displayed at any depth and arranged in a single, flat list
1- This means only the top-level pages will be displayed
2, 3....- This means pages will be displayed at a given depth.
5. echo
argument type==?(boolean)
Using this argument toggles the display of generated list of links or returns the page list as an HTML text string to be used in PHP. Here the values that can be assigned to this argument:
1(True)- this is the default value and displays the generated list items
0(False)
6. short_order
argument type==> (string)
This argument changes the sort order of the list of pages in an ascending or descending order. Valid values for this argument include:
'ASC'- This sorts the page list from lowest to highest. It is the default value for this argument.
'DESC'- This sorts the page list from highest to lowest
7. exclude
argument type ==> (string)
This argument defines a comma-separated list of page IDs that need to be excluded from the page list. For example, exclude= 2, 5, 21 and son on). There is no default value for this argument.
8. exclude_tree
argument type ==> (string)
This argument defines a comma-separated list of parent page ID;s that need to be excluded from the page list. You can use this argument for excluding a parent page id and all child pages for the respective parent page. For example, 'exclude_tree=6' will exclude the parent page 6 along with its child pages.
9. link_before:
argument type ==> (string)
Use this argument for setting the text or HTML which precedes the link text available inside the tag.
10. link_after:
argument type ==> (string)
Use this argument for setting the text or html that follows the link text available inside the tag.
11. sort_column:
argument type ==> (string)
This argument will sort the list of pages in multiple ways with the default setting being sorted alphabetically using Page title. Here is a look at some of the values for you to choose from, for this argument:
'post_title' - Use this value for sorting Pages alphabetically (by title). This is the default value displayed for the argument.
'menu_order' - Use this value to sort Pages by Page Order. Here, make a note of key difference between Page Order and Page ID. The Page ID is a unique number assigned by WordPress to every post or page.
'post_date' - Use this value to sort pages by their creation time.
'post_modified'- Use this value for sorting pages by time last modified.
'ID' - Use this value for sorting pages by numeric Page ID.
'post_author' - Use this value for sorting pages by the Page author's numeric ID.
'post_name' - Use this value for sorting pages alphabetically by Post slug.
12. sort_order:
argument type ==> (string)
This argument will change the sort order of the list of pages in an ascending or descending order. Valid values for this argument include:
'ASC'- Use this value for sorting the pages from lowest to highest.
'DESC'- Use this value for sorting pages from highest to lowest.
13. Walker:
Walker is an abstract class which simply "walks" through each node within a tree(for eg: an object or associative array) and executes an abstract function at each node. As a developer, you need to define abstract methods within the custom child class for taking an action at each of the nodes.
14. post_type :
argument type ==> (string)
This argument will list all posts associated with a certain hierarchical Post Type. Valid values for this argument include:
'page'
'revision'
Hierarchical Custom Post Types
15 ) post_status :
argument type ==> (string)
This argument will display a comma-separated list of post status types to return. Valid values for this argument include: 'publish, private, draft'.
Now, in order to show the pages and their sub-pages, just use the below code snippet:
That's it!
Summing Up
Hopefully all the pointers covered above would definitely help out in calling pages dynamically via your WordPress admin panel. Do drop in your feedback and/or suggestions regarding the post.
Ben Wilson is expert WP Developer for WordPrax Ltd & expert in converting HTML to WordPress theme. He also provides concrete information on front end development and WordPress development. If you have any concern or question related to Wordpress, you can get in touch with him.