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Get taxonomy name from 'Taxonomy' field and insert into custom loop as category?

  • Hi guys,
    Struggling a bit here and need some help I have read through the documentation but I just can’t seem to get the information I need.

    I have a custom post type and I have created a page template with a loop to get posts from this custom post type. This is all done fine.

    I have 10 categories associated with this CPT, and I am creating a page for each of these categories to display the associated category posts along with other information. I only want to create 1 page template with an easy way to link up the pages to display the associated category for this CPT.

    So for this template I have added the ‘Taxononmy’ field from ACF. So on each edit page I can select the associated category with that page. So everything that is returned is relevant.

    See my loop code below and if any one can tell me how I pass this ‘Taxonomy’ info into my loop based on using the ‘Taxonomy’ field in ACF I would be most thankful!

    <?php
$paged = (get_query_var('paged')) ? get_query_var('paged') : 1;
$args = array (
	'post_type'	=> 'exercise-database',
    'taxonomy'  =>  ,
    'pagination'	=> true,
	'paged'         => $paged,
	'order'		=> 'DESC',
); ?>

<?php global $wp_query;
$wp_query = new WP_Query( $args ); ?>

<?php if ($wp_query->have_posts()) : while ($wp_query->have_posts()) : $wp_query->the_post(); ?>

  • Do your have the field set to save and load terms?

    the taxonomy query added to your arguments should look something like this: see https://codex.wordpress.org/Class_Reference/WP_Query

    
$args = array (
    'post_type'	=> 'exercise-database',
    'tax_query'  =>  array(
      array(
        'taxonomy' => 'your taxonomy here',
        'terms' => array($term_id), // <= this needs to be an array of term id, can have a single value
        'operator' => 'IN'
      )
    ),
    'pagination'	=> true,
	'paged'         => $paged,
	'order'		=> 'DESC',
);

    But before you go to the trouble of creating a custom page template for every category you should think about using the template hierarchy built into WP. If you have a custom post type and you add a custom taxonomy for the CPT then you only need to create 3 template files: archive-{$custom-post-type}.php, single-{$custom-post-type}.php and taxonomy-{$custom-taxonomy}.php. It would be a lot easier than building and doing custom queries for every category.

  • Thanks John. I will try this in the morning and let you know.

    In regards to templates, what you have suggested is exactly what I’ve done and what I was avoiding was making more then one ‘page template’ file.

    When I refered to creating pages for the 10 categories I meant in the sense of adding 10 pages via the wp backend. I would then use the one page template I’ve created called ‘Exercise Category’ this page template would have the ‘Taxononmy’ field from ACF so I could link the two; page and the specific category loop together. Thus meaning I dont have to create 10 page templates and hard code the category into each loop on each page.

    I hope im making sense!

    Appreciate the help

  • I was confused when you said “page templates” If you have a template for taxonomy-{$custom-taxonomy}.php then you don’t need to do a query to get the posts in the custom taxonomy. WP already does that for you, you just need to create a loop to show the posts, basically the same as category.php, you can even copy that to start from.

  • Hi John,
    I’m not sure if I’ve over complicated things here or not but I have tried your code above replaced the taxonomy name with my own taxonomy and have set on the ACF field, save and load terms to yes and I have return value set to Term ID but I just get a posts not found message. I have double checked that I have selected the correct category in the Taxonomy field on the edit page screen and double checked I have posts associated with that category but still shows posts not found.

    I tried returning post object, as well as a mixture of save and load terms…

    Little confused by your last message but again it may be me not explaining it correctly so I will do my best below to outline exactly what it is I am trying to achieve.

    I have a custom post type with custom taxonomies (categories and tags). This is all working correctly no problems here I can get them to display in a loop perfectly as well.

    This CPT is called ‘Exercise Database’, I then have 2 taxonomies associated with it:

    Exercise Categories
    Exercise Tags

    Inside Exercise Categories, I have created 10 different categories for different body parts. Chest, back, abs… and so on.

    I have also created a separate ‘Page Template’ called ‘Exercise Category Template’, this has nothing to do with necessary CPT files ‘single-‘, ‘archive-‘ and ‘taxononmy-‘. This is a theme based template that can be used on multiple pages via the add pages screen.

    The reason I need this page template is because: For each body part (category within the taxonomy) I need a separate page of information as well as the ability to only display exercises for that part of the body. I don’t want chest exercises on the back page. I only want to show the posts with the category of chest for the chest page.

    Hence my need for the custom loop because I need to pass the ‘back’ category from the custom taxonomy ‘Exercise Categories’ into the page that I have about back exercises. This is the same for each of the 10 pages.

    So I used the ‘Taxonomy’ ACF field so that I could hopefully insert the correct category back, chest or whichever one I needed into the loop and then the page only shows the posts from whichever category I have selected.

    Hopefully this will give you a thorough understanding of what I am trying to achieve, I am sorry I have only just started working with PHP but hopefully this will help!

    Thank you

  • Yes, that makes more sense. If I’m understanding correctly then the changes to the query that I posted should be working. Maybe it has something to do with using the global $wp_query variable, you shouldn’t be doing that.

    also, just to be sure, did you change your taxonomy here to the slug for your custom taxonomy and $term_id to the term ID that you want to return?

    
<?php
  $paged = (get_query_var('paged')) ? get_query_var('paged') : 1;
  $args = array (
    'post_type'	=> 'exercise-database',
    'tax_query'  =>  array(
      array(
        'taxonomy' => 'your taxonomy here',
        'terms' => array($term_id),
        'operator' => 'IN'
      )
    ),
    'pagination' => true,
    'paged' => $paged,
    'order' => 'DESC',
  );

  $my_query = new WP_Query( $args );
  if ($mny_query->have_posts()) {
    while ($wp_query->have_posts()) {
      $wp_query->the_post();
      ?><h2><?php the_title(); ?></h2><?php 
    } // end while
   wp_reset_postdata();
  } // end if

  • Hi John,

    Yes I changed ‘your taxonomy here’ to ‘exercise-categories’ which is my Taxonomy.

    Then this is what I am getting confused on, the $term_id this is what I am trying to pull in from the ACF Taxonomy Field. So on my edit page I select the category I want to pull in lets say ‘Back’ which is a category inside the Taxonomy ‘Exercise-Categories’.

    How do I pull it in?

    Thanks

  • Ok I just got it working using this!

    <?php
                
                $paged = (get_query_var('paged')) ? get_query_var('paged') : 1;
                $term_id = get_field('exercise_category') ;
                  $args = array (
                    'post_type'	=> 'exercise-database',
                    'tax_query'  =>  array(
                      array(
                        'taxonomy' => 'exercise-categories',
                        'terms' => array($term_id),
                        'operator' => 'IN'
                      )
                    ),
                    'pagination' => true,
                    'paged' => $paged,
                    'order' => 'DESC',
                  );
            ?>

                                
            <?php global $wp_query; $wp_query = new WP_Query( $args ); ?>

                    <?php if ($wp_query->have_posts()) : while ($wp_query->have_posts()) : $wp_query->the_post(); ?>

    Looks like I needed to get the field and return as term_id. Im glad that works!
    Could you let me know why you advise not to use ‘global $wp_query’. I think the reason I am using that is something to do with the CPT, but I am all ears…

    Thanks John

  • Honestly, I’m not sure of the effects that using $wp_query will have. It may have no effect in your case, but in other cases it could. It’s simply safer and a better practice to use a new variable when creating a nested query/loop.

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