Getting images from media library and get_the_date() not working

Question

I've got a function to display all images in the media library on a page. I would like to display the date of each image, but using get_the_date() only returns today's date.

Here is the code I'm using:

function get_images_from_media_library() {
$args = array(
    'post_type' => 'attachment',
    'post_mime_type' =>'image',
    'post_status' => 'inherit',
    'order'    => 'DESC'
        );
$query_images = new WP_Query( $args );
$images = array();
foreach ( $query_images->posts as $image) {
    $images[]= $image->guid;
}
return $images;
    }

function display_images_from_media_library() {

$imgs = get_images_from_media_library();
$html = '<div id="media-gallery">';

foreach($imgs as $img) {

    $html .= '<img src="' . $img . '" alt="" />';
    echo get_the_date('F j, Y');
}

$html .= '</div>';

return $html;

}

I could someone show me where I'm going wrong?

Answer 1

get_the_date depends on the global $post variable. It is a bit hard to tell that that is the case but if you look at the source for get_the_date you'll see that it uses get_post and it assumes $post if no other parameters are given.

Your code never sets that global $post variable except for when your WP_Query initially runs. You need to refactor. I would return the post objects from get_images_from_media_library and construct a more standard Loop to process them.

I think this should be better.

function get_images_from_media_library() {
  $args = array(
    'post_type' => 'attachment',
    'post_mime_type' =>'image',
    'post_status' => 'inherit',
    'order'    => 'DESC'
  );
  $query_images = new WP_Query( $args );
  return $query_images;
}

function display_images_from_media_library() {
  $imgs = get_images_from_media_library();
  $html = '<div id="media-gallery">';
  global $post;
  if ($imgs->have_posts()) {
    while($imgs->have_posts()) {
      $imgs->the_post();
      $html .= '<img src="' . $post->guid . '" alt="" />';
      $html .=  get_the_date('F j, Y');
    }
  }
  $html .= '</div>';
  return $html;
}
echo display_images_from_media_library();