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Post to a URL Using cURL and PHP

c.bavota — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 17:48:16 +0000

A client needed me to write a script that would collect information from their database and post it to a specific URL, just like it was being submitted by a form. I tried messing around with the idea and the solution I came up with required the cURL library for PHP.

The script is pretty simple. First, let’s collect some data into an array:

$data = array(
   "name" => "c.bavota",
   "website" => "http://bavotasan.com",
   "twitterID" => "bavotasan"
);

Now comes the function to post the data to an URL using cURL:

function post_to_url($url, $data) {
   $fields = '';
   foreach($data as $key => $value) { 
      $fields .= $key . '=' . $value . '&'; 
   }
   rtrim($fields, '&');
 
   $post = curl_init();
 
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_URL, $url);
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_POST, count($data));
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $fields);
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
 
   $result = curl_exec($post);
 
   curl_close($post);
}

The function takes two parameters: the URL and the data array. If you need the returning results from the URL you’re posting to, you can remove that last curl_setopt line.

   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);

With all that in place, now you can easily call the function, passing the two required parameters.

function post_to_url($url, $data) {
   $fields = '';
   foreach($data as $key => $value) { 
      $fields .= $key . '=' . $value . '&'; 
   }
   rtrim($fields, '&');
 
   $post = curl_init();
 
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_URL, $url);
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_POST, count($data));
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS, $fields);
   curl_setopt($post, CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER, 1);
 
   $result = curl_exec($post);
 
   curl_close($post);
}
 
$data = array(
   "name" => "c.bavota",
   "website" => "http://bavotasan.com",
   "twitterID" => "bavotasan"
);
 
post_to_url("http://yoursite.com/post-to-page.php", $data);

On the receiving end, you can treat it just like you would if you were using a form to post the information to that specific URL.

Shorten Your Post Titles in WordPress

c.bavota — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 15:24:22 +0000

This is not a function that you would need to use often, but I came across a reason to use it recently and I thought it might be a good idea to share it. All it does is limit the number of words in your title, just in case you don’t want it to wrap onto a second line. I used it in the featured slideshow on Magazine Premium since the size of the boxes is fixed.

Include this in your functions.php file between the PHP tags:

function short_title($after = '', $length) {
	$mytitle = explode(' ', get_the_title(), $length);
	if (count($mytitle)>=$length) {
		array_pop($mytitle);
		$mytitle = implode(" ",$mytitle). $after;
	} else {
		$mytitle = implode(" ",$mytitle);
	}
	return $mytitle;
}

Then you can use it within the WordPress loop like this:

 echo short_title('...', 8); ?>

If you would rather count by characters instead of just words, you can add this function to your functions.php file instead of the one above:

function short_title($after = null, $length) {
	$mytitle = get_the_title();
	$size = strlen($mytitle);
	if($size>$length) {
		$mytitle = substr($mytitle, 0, $length);
		$mytitle = explode(' ',$mytitle);
		array_pop($mytitle);
		$mytitle = implode(" ",$mytitle).$after;
	}
	return $mytitle;
}

Excluding Pages from WordPress Search

c.bavota — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 20:05:18 +0000

When people visit my site and do a search, I assume they’re looking for results within my posts and not in any of my static pages. Too bad WordPress automatically searches through both. In order to exclude pages from the WordPress search, you need to add a small piece of code to the functions.php file. I found a solution on WP Recipes but I was not a fan of having to add all of my category IDs in order to make it work. So I decided to modify it a bit.

function SearchFilter($query) {
    if ($query->is_search) {
        $query->set('post_type', 'post');
    }
    return $query;
}
 
add_filter('pre_get_posts','SearchFilter');

I forced it to just search for posts through setting the post_type. You can also make it do the opposite by setting the post_type to page.

Quick Function to Shorten the Post Title in WordPress

c.bavota — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 20:46:16 +0000

For some reason, a lot of people seem to be using extremely long post titles. I am a firm believer in making a title as precise as possible to make it easier on people who are trying to actually find your article. Sure, I guess you can throw in as many keywords as you want in hopes that you might get more from Google, but I doubt that will really do anything for your site’s SEO.

In case you are one of those people who feel the need for extremely long post titles and you want to display them in places where they might not fit, here is a quick piece of code that you can add to your functions.php file.

function short_title($after = '', $length) {
	$mytitle = explode(' ', get_the_title(), $length);
	if (count($mytitle)>=$length) {
		array_pop($mytitle);
		$mytitle = implode(" ",$mytitle). $after;
	} else {
		$mytitle = implode(" ",$mytitle);
	}
	return $mytitle;
}

You can call the function like so:

 
// short_title($after, $length)
echo short_title('...', 10); 
?>

The above code will truncate your title at 10 words and add a trailing ellipsis.

Check if a Page is a Child of Another Page in WordPress

c.bavota — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 17:11:26 +0000

This post has been updated in “is_child() Conditional Function for WordPress”.

WordPress has some default conditional tags that are really helpful when developing themes and plugins that need specific functions on specific pages. Strange enough though, there is no way to check if a page is a child of another page.

This small function checks the database to see if the page happens to have a parent page assigned to it. If so, then the function will return true.

function is_child($pageID) { 
	global $post; 
	if( is_page() && ($post->post_parent==$pageID) ) {
               return true;
	} else { 
               return false; 
	}
}

Place the above code in your theme’s functions.php file, or create a functions.php file and place it in your theme’s directory. Then you can use the is_child() function anywhere in your theme. Your code would look something like this:


if(is_child(343)) {
echo "This is a child page of 'The Parent Page Title'.";
}
?>

Display a List of Upcoming Posts in WordPress

c.bavota — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 05:10:51 +0000

When you have completed a post in WordPress, you have the ability to save it as a draft, publish it immediately or schedule a future date when it will be published automatically. This is extremely helpful if you want to plan ahead or if you use your WP site for events. Creating a simple list of upcoming posts lets your visitors know what they can look forward to and is pretty simple to do.

The following code can be placed in your sidebar on within any template.


$futurePosts = new WP_Query();
$futurePosts->query('showposts=5&post_status=future&order=ASC');
 
if ($futurePosts->have_posts()) : while ($futurePosts->have_posts()) :
?>

 the_title(); ?>
 the_time(get_option('date_format')); ?>

 endwhile; else: ?>

 No upcoming events.

 endif; ?>

If you want to only display future posts from a specific category, you can add a cat=$id to the query like so:

$futurePosts->query('showposts=5&post_status=future&order=ASC&cat=12');

Be sure to change the “12″ to the category ID.

Using jQuery to make an Expandable Code Box for WP-Syntax

c.bavota — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:43:00 +0000

You may have noticed that I’m using a new syntax highlighter for my code snippets. I installed Ryan McGeary‘s WordPress plugin WP-Syntax which uses GeSHi (Generic Syntax Highlighter), a simple highlighting class that supports multiple coding languages. It’s great but I’m not a fan of the horizontal scrollbar that appears if code extends past your site’s width. Instead, I decided to use jQuery to expand the box when you hover over it.

We need to make a few minor changes to the plugin code to get this to work. After you have downloaded, installed and activated the plugin, open up wp-syntax.php and go to line #113:

    if ($line)
    {
        $output .= "\"line_numbers\">";
        $output .= wp_syntax_line_numbers($code, $line);
        $output .= " \"code\">";
        $output .= $geshi->parse_code();
        $output .= "
";
    }
    else
    {
        $output .= "\"code\">";
        $output .= $geshi->parse_code();
        $output .= "
";
    }

We need to add a table to the second output.

    if ($line)
    {
        $output .= "\"line_numbers\">";
        $output .= wp_syntax_line_numbers($code, $line);
        $output .= " \"code\">";
        $output .= $geshi->parse_code();
        $output .= "
";
    }
    else
    {
        $output .= "";
        $output .= "\"code\">";
        $output .= $geshi->parse_code();
        $output .= "
";
        $output .= "
";
    }

Next we need to open up wp-syntax.css to change a few of the styles. Change this:

.wp_syntax {
  color: #100;
  background-color: #f9f9f9;
  border: 1px solid silver;
  margin: 0 0 1.5em 0;
  overflow: auto;
}

to:

.wp_syntax {
  color: #100;
  background-color: #f9f9f9;
  border: 1px solid silver;
  margin: 0 0 1.5em 0;
  overflow: hidden;
  width: 590px;
}

I put a fixed width of 590px because I have set that as the maximum width of my single posts.

Now comes the jQuery. Open up your theme’s header.php file and add the following between your tags.:


<script type="text/javascript">
jQuery(document).ready(function(){
	jQuery(".wp_syntax").hover(function() {
	var width = jQuery("table", this).width();
	var pad = width + 5;
	if (width > 590) {
		jQuery(this)
			.stop(true, false)
			.css({
				zIndex: "100",
				position: "relative"
			})
			.animate({
				width: pad + "px"
			});
		}
	}, function() {
			jQuery(this).stop(true, false).animate({
				width: 590
		});
	});
});
script>

What we are doing above is creating an effect that will only occur when you hover over the code box. It finds the width of the table and animates the expansion to the full width. When you hover out, the box returns to the fixed width of your post. Be sure that you set the two references to 590 to whatever you set your width to in the CSS.

Done and done!

To see this in action check out How to Create a Twitter Feed on Your Web Site.

Resource: Making an Expanding Code Box by Chris Coyier

Display Random Posts in WordPress

c.bavota — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:16:23 +0000

I am working on a new WordPress site and I wanted to display a selection of random posts at the bottom of every page. It is pretty simple to do, but I also wanted to make sure that on single post pages, the current post would be excluded. That took a little bit more figuring out but I got it working.

Here is a quick piece of code to insert into your WordPress templates so that you can display a list of random posts, excluding the current post that is displayed.

 
global $post;
$postid = $post->ID;
$args = array(
'orderby' => 'rand',
'showposts'=>5,
'post__not_in'=>array($postid)
);
query_posts($args);
echo '';
while (have_posts()) : the_post();
echo '.get_permalink().'" title="'.the_title('','',false).'">'.the_title('','',false).'
';
endwhile;
echo '
';
?>

You can always change the number of random posts displayed by increasing or decreasing the ‘showposts’ variable. You can also make it category specific by adding a 'cat'=>24, to the $args array, where ’24′ is the category ID.

Win a One-Year Subscription to Layers Magazine

c.bavota — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 19:08:53 +0000

October is here and that means it’s time for another contest. This month I will be giving away a one-year subscription to Layers Magazine. For those who have never heard of Layers Magazine, it is the #1 how-to magazine for everything Adobe. Each issue features tutorials, reviews, designer inteviews and a whole lot more. To win a one-year subscription, all you need to do is link to this post on your site. It is as simple as that.

Just create your own link to this article or use the following code:

Win a One-Year Subscription to Layers Magazine

On November 1st, 2009, I will randomly select a trackback and award the winner a one-year subscription to Layers Magazine.

This contest is only open to residents of Canada and the United States. The winner will be contacted through their Web site on November 1st, 2009. Contest ends October 31st at 11:59pm.

Custom Template for Single Posts in WordPress

c.bavota — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 14:10:44 +0000

If you take a look at the template hierarchy in WordPress, you will notice that you have the ability to create custom templates for different category pages by simply adding the category slug or id to the end of your filename. So category-articles.php will be called before category.php if you query the Articles category. But what if you wanted to have a custom template for every post in the Articles category so that it displayed differently from posts in other categories. By default that can’t be done unless you do a little hacking.

Here is an easy way to create custom templates for single posts in WordPress.

First, we need to figure out the category id of the posts we want to customize. Open up your wp-admin and go to the Categories page. Click on the category you want and then take a look in the address bar. You should see something like this:

The 32 at the end is your category id.

Now open up your single.php file and let’s make a few changes. I will use the single.php file from the Default theme as an example.


/**
* @package WordPress
* @subpackage Default_Theme
*/
 
get_header();
?>
 

 
 if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
 

 previous_post_link('« %link') ?>
 next_post_link('%link »') ?>

 
 post_class() ?> id="post- the_ID(); ?>">
 the_title(); ?>
 

 the_content('Read the rest of this entry »
'); ?>
 
 wp_link_pages(array('before' => 'Pages: ', 'after' => '
', 'next_or_number' => 'number')); ?>
 the_tags( 'Tags: ', ', ', '
'); ?>
 


This entry was posted
 /* This is commented, because it requires a little adjusting sometimes.
You'll need to download this plugin, and follow the instructions:
http://binarybonsai.com/wordpress/time-since/ */
/* $entry_datetime = abs(strtotime($post->post_date) - (60*120)); echo time_since($entry_datetime); echo ' ago'; */ ?>
on  the_time('l, F jS, Y') ?> at  the_time() ?>
and is filed under  the_category(', ') ?>.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the  post_comments_feed_link('RSS 2.0'); ?> feed.
 
 if ( comments_open() && pings_open() ) {
// Both Comments and Pings are open ?>
You can <a href="#respond">leave a responsea>, or <a href="" rel="trackback">trackbacka> from your own site.
 
 } elseif ( !comments_open() && pings_open() ) {
// Only Pings are Open ?>
Responses are currently closed, but you can <a href=" " rel="trackback">trackbacka> from your own site.
 
 } elseif ( comments_open() && !pings_open() ) {
// Comments are open, Pings are not ?>
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
 
 } elseif ( !comments_open() && !pings_open() ) {
// Neither Comments, nor Pings are open ?>
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
 
 } edit_post_link('Edit this entry','','.'); ?>
 


 


 
 comments_template(); ?>
 
 endwhile; else: ?>
 
Sorry, no posts matched your criteria.
 
 endif; ?>
 

 
 get_footer(); ?>

To get this little hack to work all you need to do is add:


if(in_category(32)) {
// Custom Template for Single Posts in Category 32
include 'single-32.php';
} else {
?>

On line #1 and:

 } ?>

All the way at the bottom.

So now your single.php file should look like this:


if(in_category(32)) {
include 'single-32.php';
} else {
?>

/**
* @package WordPress
* @subpackage Default_Theme
*/
 
get_header();
?>
 

 
 if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
 

 previous_post_link('« %link') ?>
 next_post_link('%link »') ?>

 
 post_class() ?> id="post- the_ID(); ?>">
 the_title(); ?>
 

 the_content('Read the rest of this entry »
'); ?>
 
 wp_link_pages(array('before' => 'Pages: ', 'after' => '
', 'next_or_number' => 'number')); ?>
 the_tags( 'Tags: ', ', ', '
'); ?>
 


This entry was posted
 /* This is commented, because it requires a little adjusting sometimes.
You'll need to download this plugin, and follow the instructions:
http://binarybonsai.com/wordpress/time-since/ */
/* $entry_datetime = abs(strtotime($post->post_date) - (60*120)); echo time_since($entry_datetime); echo ' ago'; */ ?>
on  the_time('l, F jS, Y') ?> at  the_time() ?>
and is filed under  the_category(', ') ?>.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the  post_comments_feed_link('RSS 2.0'); ?> feed.
 
 if ( comments_open() && pings_open() ) {
// Both Comments and Pings are open ?>
You can <a href="#respond">leave a responsea>, or <a href="" rel="trackback">trackbacka> from your own site.
 
 } elseif ( !comments_open() && pings_open() ) {
// Only Pings are Open ?>
Responses are currently closed, but you can <a href=" " rel="trackback">trackbacka> from your own site.
 
 } elseif ( comments_open() && !pings_open() ) {
// Comments are open, Pings are not ?>
You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
 
 } elseif ( !comments_open() && !pings_open() ) {
// Neither Comments, nor Pings are open ?>
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
 
 } edit_post_link('Edit this entry','','.'); ?>
 


 


 
 comments_template(); ?>
 
 endwhile; else: ?>
 
Sorry, no posts matched your criteria.
 
 endif; ?>
 

 
 get_footer(); ?>
 } ?>

Now all you need to do is create a file called single-32.php and add it to your theme. Code that file however you want your single page posts in category 32 to appear and you are done.

You can also use this hack if you want to create a custom template for a specific post. Just replace in_category() with is_page().