Categories with same name and/or slug issue? Solution required.

It sounds as though your problem is the plugin, not WP. It looks like you need to edit, or maybe just update the plugin.

Yes I agree, the plugin is up to date.

I was hoping a solution may be found by locating the section of code in the wordpress files that relates to how the slug is created when the form field is left blank.

For example I’m assuming wordpress checks if the slug field is blank, and if so, uses $cat_name as the entry instead.

I was hoping to be able to change that to something like rand() to give each category and random but unique slug. The actual name of the slug is irrelevant to me, I just require each to be unique without me having to do it. Obviously I could add one category at a time, specifying unique slugs for each but I require to add hundreds of categories.

Any further thoughts welcomed?

Many Thanks.
Jason.

It may seem locating the following lines of code in wordpress core may be exactly what I need:

// If no slug was provided make it empty so that
// WordPress will generate one.
if(empty($category_slug)) {
$category_slug = “”;
}

Basically wordpress is being told to generate a slug if empty.
My thoughts were where:
//
$category_slug = “”;
//
modify to:
//
$category_slug = “rand()”;
//
to create a random string for each slug.

What do you think?
Many Thanks
Jason

If you are thinking editing the core files you are headed down the road to painful upgrades. At least consider hooking a function to, maybe add_category or create_category.

I wouldn’t generate random slugs. Random is more or less meaningless to humans and its hard to remember. I think you’d be better off cooking up some other more meaningful way to generate the slugs, if you don’t like how WP does it.

But again, it looks like the plugin is the problem so why not edit the plugin instead of WP? Sorry if I’ve misunderstood. I can’t tell from your posts which you are planning.

Thankyou for your reply

It makes sense to alter the plugin however with amateur knowledge of php that process may require alot of work as I am unsure how much upgrading the plugin may require to intergrate a solution.

I should define the needs for the solution a little better, sorry:

Due to the fact I need to add multiple categories of the same name over and over again each “lot” if you like assigned to a different parent,

for example:

Parent A
— Cat One

Parent B
— Cat One

Parent C
— Cat One

As you can see I need “Cat One” to repeat multiple times in each “Parent” with the problem being that wordpress automatically assigns cat_name as the category slug when the category field is left blank. – I cannot fill each slug field manually, it needs to be left automatic.

The actual slug parameter is irrelevant as they will never be used to access the URL by users having to remember it, thus a random string is only neccessary to ensure each category gets a unique slug so that wordpress allows me to add multiples of the same name.

Many Thanks
Jason

It makes sense to alter the plugin however with amateur knowledge of php that process may require alot of work as I am unsure how much upgrading the plugin may require to intergrate a solution.

You need no more knowledge to alter the plugin than to alter the WP core files.

…the problem being that wordpress automatically assigns cat_name as the category slug when the category field is left blank…

Right. So edit your plugin so that it isn’t submitting an empty slug. Prepend the parent category slug or something like that. This is probably not that difficult to accomplish though I can’t say for sure as I don’t know which plugin you are using.

The actual slug parameter is irrelevant as they will never be used to access the URL by users having to remember it, thus a random string is only neccessary to ensure each category gets a unique slug so that wordpress allows me to add multiples of the same name.

Right now this might not matter but you may want to tweak things in the future and you might then find that understandable slugs are easier to work with.

Hello,

ah, now I see what your getting at. I never thought of editing the plugin in that way.
Thankyou for your help, this is good news, gives me something to work on.

Many Thanks.
Jason.

Instead of editing the plugin to do this isn’t there another plugin we can use? Because the last time I started messing around editing plugins I messed up my whole blog so I’m a bit nervous about doing that again! Thanks.

Harry

Which is why lots of developers don’t do testing or modifications directly on their websites. Instead they setup a local copy that’s accessible via https://localhost.

If you run a local installation (with a copy of your live site’s database if necessary) then you won’t have any worries if something goes wrong..

Then again, if you’re not confident in editing php or files, then why do it, and without backing up?..

If you wish to learn how the code works, then a good approach is to learn by doing, it’s how i got what i’m at with my coding abilities. If you don’t have any such intention then the question i suppose is, why are you not instead soliciting help from a professional?