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I'm coding my first WP shortcode and am having trouble turning my working PHP into a working shortcode. I have successfully created a basic shortcode that returns text in the spot I'd like so that much is good. But I'm not doing so well putting the chocolate in the peanut butter.

Here's what I have for the working PHP:

<div class="authorsocial">
    <h5>Connect, Share &amp; Follow</h5>
        <ul>
           <?php $meta_socialgr = apply_filters('the_content', get_post_meta($post->ID, 'author_goodreads', true));
              if (!empty($meta_socialgr)) { ?>
                <li><a href="<?php echo get_post_meta( $post->ID, 'author_goodreads', true );?>"><img src="http://fiddlehead.milkbossindustries.com/files/goodreads.jpg"></a></li>
           <?php } ?>
        </ul>
</div><!-- end authorsocial -->

And here is my basic shortcode:

<?php
// Adding a shortcode to return each author's social media links
    function funcauthor_social( $atts ){
        $output = 'bubbalicious';
        return $output;
    }
    add_shortcode( 'author_social', 'funcauthor_social' );
?>

I'm not having much success in replacing "bubbalicious" with my functions as I'm just not grasping...something.

<?php
// Adding a shortcode to return each author's social media links
    function funcauthor_social( $atts ){
        $output = '<div class="authorsocial">
        <h5>Connect, Share &amp; Follow</h5>
        <ul>'.$meta_socialgr = apply_filters('the_content', get_post_meta($post->ID, 'author_goodreads', true));
             if (!empty($meta_socialgr)) { '
             <li><a href="'.echo get_post_meta( $post->ID, 'author_goodreads', true );.'"><img src="http://fiddlehead.milkbossindustries.com/files/goodreads.jpg"></a></li>'.}.'
        </ul>
      </div>';
      return $output;
 }
    add_shortcode( 'author_social', 'funcauthor_social' );
    ?>
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1

Separate out your logic from the string you want to return:

<?php
// Adding a shortcode to return each author's social media links
    function funcauthor_social( $atts ){
        $meta_socialgr = esc_url(get_post_meta( $post->ID, 'author_goodreads', true ));

        $output = '<div class="authorsocial"><h5>Connect, Share &amp; Follow</h5><ul>';

        if (!empty($meta_socialgr)) { 
            $output .= '<li><a href="'.$meta_socialgr.'"><img src="http://fiddlehead.milkbossindustries.com/files/goodreads.jpg"></a></li>';
          }

         $output .= '</ul></div>';

        return $output;
 }
    add_shortcode( 'author_social', 'funcauthor_social' );
    ?>

It's not clear why you are applying the_content filter to $meta_socialgr which looks like it should be an url...?

Also, when displaying data from the database (or otherwise some user input) make sure you sanitize that data.

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  • Thank you Stephen. I can read through your solution and understand it (mostly, except the $url = esc_attr line). I removed the filter. However, when I implement the above, the h5 displays but the if statement does not return the image nor link. There is a url in the custom field and the field name matches the code. Thoughts anyone? – djw May 11 '12 at 4:06
  • @djw - see updated answer :). You wanted to keep the get_post_meta call, but not apply the filter to it. The esc_attr sanitises the input for use in attributes in HTML (like 'value' for inputs, or element classes etc.). Actually esc_url is more appropriate here, and I've updated the answer to use that instead. – Stephen Harris May 11 '12 at 12:37
  • Thank you. I did manage to properly remove the filter so thank you for pointing that out. And thank you for explaining esc_url better than the google. I appreciate your help. Learned a bunch! Will keep troubleshooting why it won't work in my implementation as I actually understand what you've done here. – djw May 13 '12 at 20:56
  • Got it. Needed global $post; in there after function funcauthor_social( $atts ){ which I suppose was what I was trying to accomplish with the misguided filter. A little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. :) – djw May 14 '12 at 22:17

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