Posts archive index pagination in a static page custom query

Question

In WordPress, I have a page for News that is using a specific page template I created. This page is populated by news posts assigned to the news category. I need to show only two of the latest news posts on this page with Previous / Next links at the bottom if users want to read more news. However, the next / previous links are not working. Clicking on them does go to /page/2 but it's shows the same posts. Here is my code .. any ideas / help appreciated!

<div id="primary">
<div id="content" role="main">
            <div id="news">
    <?php query_posts( "category_name=news&orderby=date&order=ASC&posts_per_page=2" ); ?>
                <?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( have_posts() ) : the_post(); ?>
                    <h1><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h1>
                    <p class="post-date">Posted on <?php the_date(); ?>
                    <?php the_excerpt(); ?>
                <?php endwhile; ?>
                <?php endif; ?>

                <div id="more-posts">
                    <div class="previous-link"><?php previous_posts_link("< previous news") ?></div><div class="next-link"><?php next_posts_link ("more news >") ?></div>
                </div>
             </div>
    </div><!-- #content -->
    </div><!-- #primary -->

Answer 1

When you perform a custom query such as this one, you have to do a bit of a "hack" to get pagination to work properly.

Change this:

<?php 
query_posts( "category_name=news&orderby=date&order=ASC&posts_per_page=2" ); 
?>

...to a WP_Query call:

<?php 
$news_query = new WP_Query( "category_name=news&orderby=date&order=ASC&posts_per_page=2" ); 
?>

And then you need to *move your custom query object into the $wp_query global`:

// Move $wp_query into a temp holder
$temp = $wp_query;
// Nullify the global object
$wp_query = null;
// Now move your custom query into the 
$wp_query = $news_query;

Then, update your loop initiation, from this:

<?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( have_posts() ) : the_post(); ?>

...to this:

<?php if ( $news_query->have_posts() ) : while ( $news_query->have_posts() ) : $news_query->the_post(); ?>

This should cause the pagination to work as expected.

When you close your loop:

<?php endwhile; ?>
<?php endif; ?>

...just restore the original $wp_query global:

<?php endwhile; ?>
<?php endif; ?>
<?php $wp_query = $temp; ?>

And you should be good to go.