Sometime, to make an archive page to look better, one needs to extract the first image of a post. With “first image” I mean the first image inserted in the gallery. Doing the trick is really easy.

First we need a function that extract the image. The function has to be called inside the “loop”:

function ximage($size='thumbnail') {
 global $post;
 $attachments = get_children(array('post_parent'=>$post->ID, 'post_status'=>'inherit', 
    'post_type'=>'attachment', 'post_mime_type'=>'image', 'order'=>'ASC', 'orderby'=>'menu_order ID' ) );

 if (empty($attachments)) return null;

 foreach ($attachments as $id=>$attachment) {
 $image = wp_get_attachment_image_src($id, $size);
 return $image[0];
 }
}

Then we can modify the “loop” (I’m using the new WordPress default theme, twentyten) which is in the file “loop.php”:

 <?php $img = ximage(); ?>
 <?php if ($img != null) { ?>
 <img src="<?php echo $img; ?>" height="150" width="150" align="left" style="margin-right: 10px;"/>
 <?php } ?>
 <?php the_excerpt(); ?>
 <br clear="all"/>   

(search “excerpt” to find where the code should be changed). The result? If still active you can see it on www.satollo.com.

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2 Comments

  1. Hi there. I recently was tasked with an assignment of extracting an image from a WordPress post and placing said image in the header of the site. After scouring the web, I have come across several different options of extracting the first image from the most recent post (which seems to work just fine). The problem is that I need to drill down. I need to extract the first image from the most recent post IN A SPECIFIC CATEGORY. The code I have starts in the functions.php page and is as follows (bear in mind that I am a PHP neophyte):

    function ximage($size=’thumbnail’) {
    global $post;
    $attachments = get_children(array(‘post_parent’=>$post->ID, ‘post_status’=>’inherit’,
    ‘post_type’=>’attachment’, ‘post_mime_type’=>’image’, ‘order’=>’ASC’, ‘orderby’=>’menu_order ID’ ) );
    if (empty($attachments)) return null;
    foreach ($attachments as $id=>$attachment) {
    $image = wp_get_attachment_image_src($id, $size);
    return $image[0];
    }
    }

    I then place the following in the header.php page where I want the image to appear:

    <img src="” height=”150″ width=”150″ align=”left” style=”margin-right: 10px;”/>

    The above code will place an image in the header that mirrors the first image from the most recent post. But just to reiterate, I need it do more than that – I need it to mirror the first image from the most recent post of a specific category. Any suggestions/solutions you have to make this happen are greatly appreciated (and if that means scrapping what I have and starting over, I am completely open to that).

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