Getting first row of Repeater with the_row_index()

• jez

• July 14, 2016 at 10:46 pm

I noticed that the_row_index() was introduced recently for the repeater field and wondered if it could be used to get the content from the first row of a repeater.

i/e you have a repeater with a row which has image and text, and you grab just the first image from that first row.

I cannot find any further documentation on the_row_index() so unsure how to even give an example.

• John Huebner

• July 14, 2016 at 11:17 pm

The function will only return the current index of the active loop. Basically you cannot access fields in a repeater without having an active have_rows() loop. This works the same as the WP have_posts() loop. Without a loop, many of the functions in WP will not work because they are only designed to work inside the loop.

// accessing only the first row of a repeater
if (have_rows('repeater')) {
  while (have_rows('repeater')) {
    the_row();
    the_sub_field('sub_field_name');
    // after doing what you want to do with the fist element
    break;
  }
}
// if you want you can reset the above row to 
// begin from the first row again
reset_rows();
// start another loop on the same field
// if you don't use reset above then it will
// start with the second row
if (have_rows('repeater')) {
  // etc....
}