Registering multiple sidebars with data from an array

Question

I am attempting to dynamically register sidebars for certain pages. The pages must meet the following criteria:

• be published
• be a page (not a post)
• use the template 'template-generic-sidebar'

In my functions.php I have created a short script using get_pages() which get a list of all pages. It counts how many of these pages match the above criteria, and stores the information required about them in an array called $sidebars_required:

$get_pages_args = array(
    'post_type' => 'page',
    'post_status' => 'publish'
    );

    $all_pages = get_pages($get_pages_args);
    $counter = 0;
    $sidebars_required = array();

foreach($all_pages as $page){
    $page_id = $page->ID;
    $page_template = get_page_template_slug($page_id);
    if (strpos($page_template,'template-generic-sidebar') !== false) {
        $counter++;
        $page_details = array(
            "ID" => $page_id,
            "title" => $page->post_title,
            "slug" => $page->post_name,
        );
        array_push($sidebars_required,$page_details);
    }
}

In my test case the required number of sidebars stored in $counter = 3. In my test case $sidebars_required look like this:

array(3) {
  [0]=>
  array(3) {
    ["ID"]=>
    int(27)
    ["title"]=>
    string(8) "About Us"
    ["slug"]=>
    string(8) "about-us"
  }
  [1]=>
  array(3) {
    ["ID"]=>
    int(13)
    ["title"]=>
    string(20) "Generic Page Example"
    ["slug"]=>
    string(20) "generic-page-example"
  }
  [2]=>
  array(3) {
    ["ID"]=>
    int(15)
    ["title"]=>
    string(9) "Resources"
    ["slug"]=>
    string(9) "resources"
  }
}

But I am stuck with registering the correct number of sidebars each with different name, as I don't know how to correctly loop through my array to create the list of $args required for register_sidebar()

I already have $counter ready to specify the number required by register_sidebars():

register_sidebars($counter);

But how can I create my $args using the page_name from my array? How do I loop through this array, but use it to fill in the $args for register_sidebars()

I am confused as to how register_sidebars allows for multiple sidebars to be registered when it doesn't allow for multiple lists of arguments to be included.

I envision something like this:

$args = array(
  'name'          => __($sidebars_required[0]['title'].'sidebar'),
  'id'            => 'sidebar-'.$sidebars_required[0][slug],
  'before_widget' => '<li id="%1$s" class="widget %2$s">',
  'after_widget'  => '</li>',
  'before_title'  => '<h2 class="widgettitle">',
  'after_title'   => '</h2>'
);

So in the above, the name of the sidebar would be e.g About Us Sidebar and it's ID would be sidebar-about-us

But obviously because there is only one $args list, there is no way to correctly register this for 3 different sidebars with different names. I am only able to create three identical sidebars.

Answer 1

I managed to solve this myself. Instead of using register_sidebars() to register the sidebars all together, I simply used the singular register_sidebar() in a for loop, so that it registered a sidebar for every matching page.

All one would need to do to get this working is change the template name (in my case template-generic-sidebar) to their own template slug/name and place this code in functions.php

$get_pages_args = array(
    'post_type' => 'page',
    'post_status' => 'publish'
    );
    $all_pages = get_pages($get_pages_args);
    $counter = 0;
    $sidebars_required = array();
    foreach($all_pages as $page){
        $page_id = $page->ID;
        $page_template = get_page_template_slug($page_id);
        if (strpos($page_template,'template-generic-sidebar') !== false) {
            $counter++;
            $page_details = array(
                "title" => $page->post_title,
                "slug" => $page->post_name,
            );
            array_push($sidebars_required,$page_details);
        }
    }
    for ($i = 1; $i <= $counter; $i++) {
        $array_counter = $i-1;
        $args = array(
            'name'          => __($sidebars_required[$array_counter]['title'].' sidebar'),
            'id'            => 'sidebar-'.$sidebars_required[$array_counter]['slug'],
            'before_widget' => '<li id="%1$s" class="widget %2$s">',
            'after_widget'  => '</li>',
            'before_title'  => '<h2 class="widgettitle">',
            'after_title'   => '</h2>'
        );
        register_sidebar($args);
    }