How to load/include category templates based on conditionals?

Question

I have this lines to get different template, I can get the desired template but also i'm getting the default template at the end of theme. I tried to skip the code with goto but this fuction is unavailable :D (old resourse) and breaking the code shows the malfuction message

"Fatal error: Cannot break/continue 1 level in... bla bla" 

<?php {if (in_category('diario') ) {  include (TEMPLATEPATH . '/diario.php');  

 } if (in_category('predicacion')) {  include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/predicacion.php'); 

 } if (in_category('audio')) { include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/audible.php'); 

 } if (in_category('video')) { include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/video.php'); 

 } else {
 include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/single_default.php'); 
 }} ?>

I also tried this lines, a copy from WP tutorial.

<?php if ( in_category('diario') ) { ?>
<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH . '/diario.php'); ?>


<?php } if (in_category('predicacion')) { ?>
<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/predicacion.php'); ?>

<?php } if (in_category('audio')) { ?>
<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/audible.php'); ?>

<?php } if (in_category('video')) { ?>
<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/video.php'); ?>

<?php } else { ?>
 <?php include (TEMPLATEPATH .'/single_default.php'); ?> 
<?php } ?>

When no selected desired template the single_default is displayed correctly.

Answer 1

This looks like a plain PHP question at the first sight, but there is also at least one WordPress issue. Let’s start with that.

You should not use include or TEMPLATEPATH in a theme. There are alternatives for include in WordPress: get_template_part() and locate_template(). And the constants TEMPLATEPATH and STYLESHEETPATH will be deprecated in the near future because they are too restricted.

In your case I would recommend to use locate_template(). It accepts three arguments:

1. An array of $template_names.
2. An argument to $load the file if it is found.
3. A $require_once parameter. We ignore this for now. and $name. Then it searches for a file named "{$slug}-{$name}.php" in your current theme directory and includes it with locate_template().

The function returns a path if it found a file and an empty string otherwise.

Let’s say your template for a single post from category video is named single-cat-video.php and the default file is named single-cat-default.php (you should always use speaking file names).

Plus, you have an array of categories to search for:

$my_cats = array( 'diario', 'predicacion', 'audio', 'video' );

Now you just walk through these category array until you found a file:

$found = FALSE;
foreach ( $my_cats as $my_cat )
{
    if (
        // we are in a category from our array and …
        in_category( $my_cat )
        // … actually found a matching file.
        and locate_template( "single-cat-$my_cat.php", TRUE ) 
        )
    {
        // As we now know that we got a template and already ↑ included it,
        // we can set a flag to avoid loading the default template.
        $found = TRUE;

        // … and immediately stop searching.
        break;
    }
}

// no matching category or no file found. load the default template part
if ( ! $found )
{
    locate_template( "single-cat-default.php", TRUE );
}

This could be written in a more compact way, but I think it is easier to read now. To add a category you just create a new template and extend the array $my_cats without the need to touch the rest of the code.