query recent posts from several categories

Question

i'd like to list my 10 most recent posts but from certain categories only - anyone can tell me how to do this?

thanks

Answer 1

simply add this above your loop

$args = array(
    'posts_per_page' => 10,
    'category__in' => array( 2, 6 ), //change and add the category ids here
    'orderby' => 'date',
    'order' => 'ASC')
query_posts($args);

and you can read more about query_posts Parameters http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/WP_Query#Parameters

Update

By popular demand :) here is another example to doing the same but using tax_query

$args = array(
    'tax_query' => array(
        array(
            'taxonomy' => 'category',
            'field' => 'slug',
            'terms' => array('category1','category2') ////change and add the category slugs here
        )
    )
    'posts_per_page' => 10,
    'orderby' => 'date',
    'order' => 'ASC')
query_posts($args);

Answer 2

Have a look at the category query parameters here:

http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/WP_Query#Category_Parameters

Answer 3

The easiest way to do this is to have use the category name in the query before the loop starts.

<?php query_posts($query_string . '&category_name='Your Category, Another Category'); ?>

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

I haven't tested it but should work.

Also check out http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/query_posts