Showing latest post without 301 redirect

Question

My WordPress website is now redirected to latest post by adding below function to function.php

add_action( 'template_redirect', 'redirect' );
function redirect() {
    $args = array(
    'numberposts' => 1,
    'post_type' => 'seller',
    'post_status' => 'publish');
    $last = wp_get_recent_posts($args);
$last_id = $last['0']['ID'];
        if ( is_home() && ! is_paged() && ! is_archive() && ! is_tag() && !isset($_GET['ptype'])  ) :
             wp_redirect( get_permalink($last_id) , 301 ); 

                exit;
        endif;
}

now, I want this feature but without changing URL to latest post! I mean when you go to http://www.example.com latest post shows without a 301 redirect to http://www.example.com/article/some-other-texts

Answer 1

Custom query loops and custom page templates are your friends.

Ditch the redirect function and on your home page template do something like this:

<?php
$args = array(
    'post_status' => 'publish',
    'post_type' => 'seller',
    'posts_per_page' => 1
);

query_posts( $args );

// the Loop
while (have_posts()) : the_post();
    the_content(  );
endwhile;
?>

You can find all args here

Answer 2

You can hook into parse_query and modify the wp_query object for the home page.

First, hook into parse_query, your hooked function will get the wp_query object as it's only argument. It's a reference, so you can change it in place. No return value necessary.

Inside your function, you can check to see if it's the main query (using the new is_main_query function) and if it's the home page. From there, change the query variables!

<?php
add_filter( 'parse_query', 'wpse41420_one_post' );
function wpse41420_one_post( $query )
{
    // make sure we're modifying the main query on the home page
    if( ! $query->is_main_query() || ! is_home() ) return;

    // Set up one post per page
    $query->query_vars['posts_per_page'] = 1;

    // ignore stick posts
    $query->query_vars['ignore_sticky_posts'] = 1;
}

As a plugin.