get_the_excerpt() with fallback like the_excerpt()

Question

You know when using the_excerpt() and no "excerpt" is set on a post it automatically uses the first 50 words or so.

Is the same also possible when using get_the_excerpt()

For instance I'm using get_the_excerpt() like this …

$return .= sprintf('
                <li>
                    <div class="title"><a href="%1$s">%2$s</a><span class="goto">a</span></div>
                    <div class="project-description">%3$s</div>
                </li>',
                get_permalink( get_the_ID() ),
                get_the_title(),
                get_the_excerpt()
        );

However if no excerpt is set, the get_the_excerpt() function doesn't show a fallback (the first 50 or so words). Any idea how to make that work?

Answer 1

The function the_excerpt() is only a echo of the function get_the_excerpt():

function the_excerpt() {
    echo apply_filters('the_excerpt', get_the_excerpt());
}

If you like a fall back for no input the excerpt meta box, then create a text from the content - get_the_content(). You can use the core function wp_trim_words() for set the counter for words and easy to set a text from all content. A example:

$excerpt = get_the_content();
$excerpt = esc_attr( strip_tags( stripslashes( $excerpt ) ) );
$excerpt = wp_trim_words( $excerpt, $num_words = 55, $more = NULL );