Single Call to Database

• revconcept

• December 5, 2013 at 9:42 am

Hi Elliot,

I was wondering…is every instance of get_field(), the_field(), the_sub_field() etc. a separate call to the database?

I’m assuming it is and was wondering if there is a way to optimize this. Something like:

global $post;
$post_meta = get_post_meta($post->ID);

<?php if($post_meta['news_update']): ?>
    <ul id="ticker">
        <?php foreach ($post_meta['news_update'] as $news_update): ?>
            <li>
                <?php echo $news_update['news_update_text']; ?>
            </li>

Versus this:

<?php if(get_field('news_update')): ?>
    <ul id="ticker">
        <?php while(has_sub_field('news_update')): ?>
            <li>
                <?php the_sub_field('news_update_text'); ?>
            </li>

Would that work? And how would you handle sub fields?

Thanks for your time!

• Elliot

• December 5, 2013 at 10:14 am

Hi @revconcept

Yes, you are correct in pointing out that the above code would be more efficient. However, with that, there are many drawbacks, such as values will not be formatted by the ACF fields, etc.

Thanks
E

• Elliot

• December 5, 2013 at 10:14 am

Hi @revconcept

Sub fields would simply not work, as they would not be formatted correctly.

Thanks
E

• Elliot

• December 5, 2013 at 10:15 am

If performance is an issue, I would look into page caching before changing all of your PHP ACF code.

Thanks
E

• revconcept

• December 5, 2013 at 11:27 am

That’s what I figured. Thanks for the response…you’re always so prompt!