Smart Excerpt

[GreatBlakes]

I've been using an enhanced excerpt function in all of my themes for the past few years, so I thought I'd post it here to see if it's worth considering. The problem I was running into was that the_excerpt didn't allow for a few parameters that I wanted to customize per iteration. The "Continue Reading" text, the excerpt length, and whether the ellipses should appear.

On top of that, I didn't like having to choose between the_excerpt() and get_the_excerpt, so I enhanced my function to accept a post ID as the first parameter, and if not, it would fallback to the current post ID (so it could be used both inside or outside the loop).

Then, I decided that instead of just using the excerpt from a post, it should pull the content if the excerpt was left empty. This would allow my to call my function for all instances, and the user could decide if they want a specific excerpt to appear for a specific post.

I'm not sure if this would be better left as a plugin or not, and if not, I'm also not sure if I'm advocating an update to the_excerpt or if it would be an additional function like smart_excerpt() or something. Anyway, here's my code:

//Pulls the excerpt for the current (or designated post ID). If no excerpt is present, it pulls from the content instead.
//Several ways to implement this:
	//Inside the loop: echo nebula_the_excerpt('Read more »', 20, 1);
	//Outside the loop: echo nebula_the_excerpt(572, 'Read more »', 20, 1);
//First parameter is the post ID (optional). Allows it to be called outside the loop. Must be an integer!
//Second parameter is the "Read More" text (optional).
//Third parameter is the length (optional).
//Fourth parameter is the ellipsis (optional). Boolean.

function nebula_the_excerpt( $postID=false, $more=false, $length=55, $hellip=false ) {

	if ( $postID ) { 
		if ( !is_int($postID) ) {
			if ( $length == 0 || $length == 1 ) {
				$hellip = $length;
			} else {
				$hellip = false;
			}

			if ( is_int($more) ) {
				$length = $more;
			} else {
				$length = 55;
			}

			$more = $postID;
			$postID = false;
		} else {
			$the_post = get_post($postID);
		}
	} 

	if ( $the_post ) {
                if ( $the_post->post_excerpt ) {
	                $string = strip_tags($the_post->post_excerpt, '<p>');
                } else {
	                $string = strip_tags($the_post->post_content, '<p>');
                }
        } else {
                if ( get_the_excerpt() ) {
                    $string = strip_tags(get_the_excerpt(), '<p>');
                } else {
                    $string = strip_tags(get_the_content(), '<p>');
                }
        }

	$string = string_limit_words($string, $length); //Note that this function is just a string limiter. I can post the code if needed.

	if ( $hellip ) {
		if ( $string[1] == 1 ) {
			$string[0] .= '&hellip; ';
		}
	}

	if ( isset($more) && $more != '' ) {
		$string[0] .= ' <a class="nebula_the_excerpt" href="' . get_permalink($postID) . '">' . $more . '</a>';
	}

	return $string[0];
}

Currently, It is not the most condensed snippet there is, and I'm sure some better programmers could optimize it considerably, but the general idea is there.

[GreatBlakes]

I've recently made some pretty heavy adjustments to enhance this function:

//Several ways to implement this:
	//Inside the loop (or outside the loop for current post/page): nebula_the_excerpt('Read more »', 20, 1);
	//Outside the loop: nebula_the_excerpt(572, 'Read more »', 20, 1);
function nebula_the_excerpt( $postID=0, $more=0, $length=55, $hellip=0 ) {
	
	if ( $postID && is_int($postID) ) {
		$the_post = get_post($postID);
	} else {
		if ( $postID != 0 || is_string($postID) ) {
			if ( $length == 0 || $length == 1 ) {
				$hellip = $length;
			} else {
				$hellip = false;
			}
			
			if ( is_int($more) ) {
				$length = $more;
			} else {
				$length = 55;
			}
			
			$more = $postID;
		}
		$postID = get_the_ID();
		$the_post = get_post($postID);
	}
	
	if ( $the_post->post_excerpt ) {
		$string = strip_tags(strip_shortcodes($the_post->post_excerpt), '');
	} else {
		$string = strip_tags(strip_shortcodes($the_post->post_content), '');
	}
	
	$string = string_limit_words($string, $length); //Note that this function is just a string limiter. I can post the code if needed.
	
	if ( $hellip ) {
		if ( $string[1] == 1 ) {
			$string[0] .= '… ';
		}
	}
		
	if ( isset($more) && $more != '' ) {
		$string[0] .= ' <a class="nebula_the_excerpt" href="' . get_permalink($postID) . '">' . $more . '</a>';
	}
	
	return $string[0];
}

[eherman24]

I personally believe it would be best left as a plugin as not all WordPress themes make use of the excerpt field. Maybe wait for other, more seasoned, core developers to chime in.

[grapplerulrich]

It is very unlikely that get_the_excerpt and the_excerpt will be replaced by another function.

I believe the whole custom function could be replaced with filters and conditionals. If want a different excerpt length on a certain page you can use a conditional. With the following code example I can change the excerpt length just on the category archive.

<?php
prefix_custom_excerpt_length( $length ) {
    if( is_category() ) {
        $length = 25;
    }
    return $length;

}
add_filter( 'excerpt_length', 'prefix_custom_excerpt_length' );

[andraganescu]

Hi @GreatBlakes and thank you for your submission. As @grapplerulrich noted above it is very unlikely that the functions themselves will be replaced.

Given the age of this ticket and that no patch has been added I will close it as wontfix.

Thanks again for your suggestions!