Introducing new Post Parent related functions in WordPress 5.7

Welcome!

The WordPress coreCore Core is the set of software required to run WordPress. The Core Development Team builds WordPress. development team builds WordPress! Follow this site for general updates, status reports, and the occasional code debate. There’s lots of ways to contribute:

Found a bugbug A bug is an error or unexpected result. Performance improvements, code optimization, and are considered enhancements, not defects. After feature freeze, only bugs are dealt with, with regressions (adverse changes from the previous version) being the highest priority.? Create a ticket in the bug tracker.

Want to contribute? Get started quickly with tickets marked as good first bugs for new contributors or join a bug scrub. There’s more on the reports page, like patches needing testing, and on feature projects page.

Other questions? Here is a detailed handbook for contributors, complete with tutorials.

Update: These functions were originally introduced as get_parent_post() and has_parent_post() but have since been renamed to get_post_parent() and has_post_parent().

In WordPress 5.7, two long awaited functions were added to determine if a post has a parent and to get the related parent Post object. These functions are quite simple to use. They reduce the logic needed in themes and plugins.

Before committing this change the pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party repository was checked for existing plugins and themes that already use either of the two functions. No plugin or theme is affected in the WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ repository.

Kind reminder for WordPress developers: if you use the get_post_parent() or has_post_parent() functions in any custom plugin or theme, please prefix them ahead of WP 5.7 to avoid any PHPPHP The web scripting language in which WordPress is primarily architected. WordPress requires PHP 5.6.20 or higher error.

For reference, this enhancementenhancement Enhancements are simple improvements to WordPress, such as the addition of a hook, a new feature, or an improvement to an existing feature. has been addressed in ticketticket Created for both bug reports and feature development on the bug tracker. #33045.

New template tagtag A directory in Subversion. WordPress uses tags to store a single snapshot of a version (3.6, 3.6.1, etc.), the common convention of tags in version control systems. (Not to be confused with post tags.): get_post_parent()

This new template tag accepts one parameter: a post ID or a WP_Post object. By default it uses the global variable $post if available. It retrieves the parent WP_Post object for the given post.

New conditional tag: has_post_parent()

This new conditional tag accepts one parameter: a post ID or a WP_Post object. By default it uses global variable $post if available. It returns true if the post has a parent, false otherwise.

Basic example of use

These two functions can be combined to display a “Back to parent page” link:

<?php if ( has_post_parent( get_the_ID() ) ) : ?>
	<a href="<?php the_permalink( get_post_parent( get_the_ID() ) ); ?>">
		<?php
		echo esc_html( sprintf(
			__( 'Back to parent page: %s', 'text-domain' ),
			get_the_title( get_post_parent( get_the_ID() ) )
		) );
		?>
	</a>
<?php endif; ?>

Props @chaton666 and @johnbillion for proofreading this dev notedev note Each important change in WordPress Core is documented in a developers note, (usually called dev note). Good dev notes generally include a description of the change, the decision that led to this change, and a description of how developers are supposed to work with that change. Dev notes are published on Make/Core blog during the beta phase of WordPress release cycle. Publishing dev notes is particularly important when plugin/theme authors and WordPress developers need to be aware of those changes.In general, all dev notes are compiled into a Field Guide at the beginning of the release candidate phase..

#5-7, #dev-notes

Drivingralle 6:49 pm on February 10, 2021

Great new functions 👍
Weston Ruter 7:21 pm on February 10, 2021

The get_the_ID() in the example is redundant since the global $post is used when no argument is supplied, correct?
- Jb Audras 7:31 pm on February 10, 2021
  
  Correct! I felt hesitant about this, but we wanted to show an example that implement the functions parameter 🙂
Sridhar Katakam 11:50 pm on February 10, 2021

Probably a silly question.. is there a reason why you would echo sprintf() when you could simply printf() instead?
- Jb Audras 12:00 am on February 11, 2021
  
  There is no silly question! And it’s totally ok to use printf if you prefer 🙂
Abdullah Ramzan 12:44 pm on February 11, 2021

Cool +1
Mike Little 3:35 pm on February 11, 2021

Just a note on escaping. The output of the sprintf() call should be escaped. Not the just the format string. The example code does not escape the output from get_the_title() which could also include translated content.
- John Blackbourn 5:55 pm on February 20, 2021
  
  Thanks Mike, the example code has been updated.
Sal Ferrarello 10:19 pm on February 11, 2021

I am against adding functions like these to the global namespace, as it seems ripe for a collision.

While the pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party repo is free of collisions, there is a lot of custom code running on WordPress that may already have functions named `get_parent_post()` or `has_parent_post()`.

While using a PHPPHP The web scripting language in which WordPress is primarily architected. WordPress requires PHP 5.6.20 or higher namespace would address this, it would open up a larger discussion.

In lieu of using a namespace, prefixing these functions with `wp_` would decrease the likelihood of collision.
Aaron Tweeton 4:45 am on February 15, 2021

Sorry if I missed it, but what’s the use case for finding a post’s parent? I can understand if it’s for a page type, but if it’s a post or other non-hierarchy post type, what would it return?
Justin Tadlock 7:32 pm on February 16, 2021

The `get_parent_post()` function will return `null` if there is no post parent.

There are use cases outside of hierarchical post types too. bbPressbbPress Free, open source software built on top of WordPress for easily creating forums on sites. https://bbpress.org. immediately comes to mind. Topics and replies are non-hierarchical post types, but they have parent posts of forums and topics, respectively. I imagine there are numerous reasons to grab the parent post in bbPress. Attachments in WP are also an example of a flat post type where the post itself would have a parent of the post it is attached to.
Carolina Nymark 5:25 am on February 17, 2021

+make.wordpress.org/themes/
Stefan Xhunga 12:50 pm on February 17, 2021

Hello All, Regarding WordPress 5.7 I need your help.
John Blackbourn 5:55 pm on February 20, 2021

Update: These functions were originally introduced as get_parent_post() and has_parent_post() but have since been renamed to get_post_parent() and has_post_parent().
Mark Jaquith 8:26 pm on March 3, 2021
Can combine these in a loopLoop The Loop is PHP code used by WordPress to display posts. Using The Loop, WordPress processes each post to be displayed on the current page, and formats it according to how it matches specified criteria within The Loop tags. Any HTML or PHP code in the Loop will be processed on each post. https://codex.wordpress.org/The_Loop. to find the top level post:
```
$first_ancestor_post = (function($post) {
    while( \has_post_parent( $post ) ) {
        $post = \get_post_parent( $post );
    }
    return $post;
})(\get_post());
```

Comments are closed.

Welcome!

Communication

New template tagtag A directory in Subversion. WordPress uses tags to store a single snapshot of a version (3.6, 3.6.1, etc.), the common convention of tags in version control systems. (Not to be confused with post tags.): get_post_parent()

New conditional tag: has_post_parent()

Basic example of use

Share this: