Get top level page parent title

Question

How do I get the page title of the upper most parent page of the page the visitor is currently on?

Let me describe:

I have this page structure:

• Example Title 1
  • Example Title 1-1
    • Example Title 1-1-1
    • Example Title 1-1-2
  • Example Title 1-2
• Example Title 2
• Example Title 3
• Example Title 4

Here is what I want to return:

• User is on Example Title 1 return Example Title 1
• User is on Example Title 1-1 return Example Title 1
• User is on Example Title 1-1-1 return Example Title 1
• User is on Example Title 2 return Example Title 2

Normally what I would do is check $post->parent and if 0 then return page title else return title of page above. Problem is that $post->parent will only go back one level. I need to use some sort of recursive function that keeps going back until $post->parent == 0.

Now I can manage this myself but the only way I could think of doing it would be to use get_post() each time but imagine I'm 8 layers deep (we need to go deeper). That would involve loading 8 pages to finally get to the top level. Anyone have a better way to do this?

Answer 1

Found this way:

if ( 0 == $post->post_parent ) {
    the_title();
} else {
    $parents = get_post_ancestors( $post->ID );
    echo apply_filters( "the_title", get_the_title( end ( $parents ) ) );
}

Anyone got a better way please answer.

Answer 2

Not sure if its the efficient one but can stop myself. Really big fan of recursive functions :). Let me know if i have done any wordpress mistake. Did it fast :)

function get_post_ancestor_title($post_id){
    $post = get_post($post_id)->post_parent;
    if ( 0 == $post->post_parent ) {
       return get_the_title();
    } else {
       get_post_ancestor_title($post->ID);
    }
}