Daily Posts plugin

Hi

I had this idea a while ago to create a plugin to show the posts on today excluding category and year. I asked Gemini to help with the code and this is what it has come up with:

<?php

/**

* Shortcode to display posts published on the current day and month, across all years.

*

* Usage: [daily_on_this_day_posts]

*/

function display_daily_posts_on_this_day_shortcode() {

// Get the current day and month

// 'j' for day of the month without leading zeros (1 to 31)

// 'n' for month number without leading zeros (1 to 12)

$current_day = date('j');

$current_month = date('n');

// Arguments for the WordPress query

$args = array(

'post_type' => 'post', // We are querying standard posts

'post_status' => 'publish', // Only show published posts

'posts_per_page' => -1, // Retrieve all posts that match the criteria

'date_query' => array( // This is the key part for matching the date

array(

'month' => $current_month, // Match the current month

'day' => $current_day, // Match the current day

// Year is intentionally omitted to match across all years

),

),

'orderby' => 'date', // Order the results by their full publication date

'order' => 'DESC', // Show the newest posts first (e.g., from most recent year)

'ignore_sticky_posts' => 1, // Do not let sticky posts interfere with the date order

// By default, WP_Query searches all categories, so no need to specify category exclusion explicitly

);

$daily_posts_query = new WP_Query($args);

// Prepare the output string

$output = '';

// Get the current date formatted nicely for the title (e.g., "May 12th")

$current_date_formatted = date('F jS'); // Using 'F jS' for "Month daySuffix", e.g., "May 12th"

if ($daily_posts_query->have_posts()) {

$output .= '<h2>Posts from ' . esc_html($current_date_formatted) . ' (Across All Years)</h2>';

// Removed the <ul> tag

while ($daily_posts_query->have_posts()) {

$daily_posts_query->the_post();

// Each post is now a separate div block

$output .= '<div class="daily-post-entry" style="margin-bottom: 30px; padding-bottom: 20px; border-bottom: 1px solid #eee; overflow: hidden;">'; // Added overflow:hidden to contain floats

// Display the featured image if it exists, floated to the left

if (has_post_thumbnail()) {

// You can change 'thumbnail' to other sizes like 'medium', 'large', or a custom size

// Added float:left and margin for spacing

$output .= '<div class="daily-post-image" style="float: left; margin-right: 15px; margin-bottom: 10px; max-width: 150px;">'; // Added max-width to control image size

$output .= get_the_post_thumbnail(get_the_ID(), 'thumbnail'); // Using 'thumbnail' size

$output .= '</div>';

}

// Container for the text content, to allow it to flow next to the image

$output .= '<div class="daily-post-content" style="overflow: hidden;">'; // overflow:hidden helps contain content next to float

// Display the post title as a link

$output .= '<h3><a href="' . esc_url(get_permalink()) . '">' . esc_html(get_the_title()) . '</a></h3>';

// Display the full publication date

$output .= '<p style="font-size: 0.9em; color: #555; margin-top: 0;">Published on: ' . esc_html(get_the_date('F jS, Y')) . '</p>'; // e.g., May 12th, 2023

// Display the excerpt

$output .= '<div style="margin-top: 5px;">' . get_the_excerpt() . '</div>';

$output .= '</div>'; // End of daily-post-content

// $output .= '<div style="clear: both;"></div>'; // Optional: explicit clear if overflow:hidden on parent isn't enough in some themes

$output .= '</div>'; // End of daily-post-entry

}

// Removed the </ul> tag

wp_reset_postdata(); // Important: Restore original post data after custom loop

} else {

$output .= '<p>No posts found for ' . esc_html($current_date_formatted) . ' from any year.</p>';

}

return $output; // Return the HTML to be displayed by the shortcode

}

// Register the shortcode so WordPress recognizes it

add_shortcode('daily_on_this_day_posts', 'display_daily_posts_on_this_day_shortcode');

?>

Should I simply post the code in the functions file or would it be better to create a plugin and update on a regular basis please? Is the code ok?

Thanks

Rich

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