switch_to_blog() for parent theme

Question

all. Just trying out switch_to_blog() as a way to have a child site get some news items from the parent site. Problem is, the parent site--first tables in database--doesn't have a number, i.e., tables are like www_posts--there's no number to put in the parentheses, 0 doesn't work, empty doesn't work.

How can I reference this original install? Also, is it no longer cool to use switch_to_blog()?

Thanks!

Answer 1

switch_to_blog(1); to switch to the root (primary) blog and pull post info.

restore_current_blog(); to switch back.

Answer 2

Another option would be to use site transients store the news items. That way it would be accessible from all network sites and you wouldn't have to call switch_to_blog to access them as I believe it is quite server intensive.

Transients API

And the specific function you would want to use for network access would be:

set_site_transient('recentnews', 'yournewsoutputhere', expiretime);

<?php echo get_site_transient('recentnews'); ?>