Image in excerpt = permalink to post wont work?

<?php the_excerpt(); ?><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"></a>

That makes no sense. You’re showing the excerpt and the link *after* it. The link to your post is empty, in order words.

Thanks for that. I’ve swapped it round & now it links to the large image (direct link just to the image, not to the post), which is better, but still a problem.

Any ideas?

As I said, I’m just learning as I go, adapting a theme, so excuse my ignorance!

What is your code now, and what is the result of it running?

the code now is:

<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php the_excerpt(); ?></a>

..the result is that the thumbnail does have a link (i.e. the cursor changes when hover, as it did when the code was wrong, actually!) but when I click it it links to the thumbnail URL instead of the post.

Ahh. Well, this is probably because the excerpt itself contains a link to the image file.

Try something like this:
<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php strip_tags(get_the_excerpt(),'<img>'); ?></a>
This will have it strip all the tags out of the excerpt except for the img tags.

How can I explain this – you’re doing something odd here, and I find it difficult to explain.

Okay, your post has the image linked to the file on your server. This is also an excerpt of the post – which is just the image. So, when you show the excerpt, you’re showing a linked image. So you’re showing a link within a link – which will link to the *last* link (God, I feel like Monty Python.)

So, what your end result is, is this (edited for clarity):

<a href="URL/archives/42">

<a href="URL TO IMAGE/adhd_large.jpg">
<img src="URL TO IMAGE/adhd_thumb.jpg">
</a>

</a>

Do you see the weirdness here? It’s going to link to the *most recent* link – which is the *image itself* not the URL to the post.

<?php the_permalink(); ?> creates a FULL URL:

<a href="URL/archives/42">
text you want to link here but you've replaced it with
 a linked image
</a>

<?php the_excerpt(); ?> *also* creates a full URL.

Am I making sense to you?

So you need to somehow strip the excerpt of it’s anchor link, so that the thumbnail you wait links to the title.

EDIT: posted at the same time as Otto – he’s got a good answer!

Thanks Otto, that makes a lot of sense!

I’ve tried your code in place of mine (I guessed that’s what you meant), but now its not showing anything…no thumbnails.

What am I doing wrong?

I’m going to read up on strip_tags now!!

Thanks again for your help.

Thanks Doodlebee. Yes, that’s starting to make sense.

I’m looking into Otto’s answer but to be honest I’m having to learn very fast!!

Strip Tags remove HTML from the excerpt, right? So, why wont that remove my image and just leave me with the text (of which there is none!!)

I’m still reading about strip tags….can’t find a list of the parameters yet.

https://php.net/strip_tags

The second parameter to strip tags is a list of tags that it won’t strip. Thus the '<img>' bit.

Thanks Otto, now I understand how strip tags works. So I understand how your workaround works.

But…..!
..it’s still not working. It’s not outputting anything. I’ve tried

<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php strip_tags(get_the_excerpt(),'<img>'); ?></a>

and

<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php strip_tags(get_the_excerpt(),'<src>'); ?></a>

..still no luck.
Any ideas?

You need to print the value.

<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php echo strip_tags(get_the_excerpt(),'<img>'); ?></a>

Yoshi, thankyou so much!

That was getting frustrating!

Thanks Otto & Doodlebee too for all your help.

Doh. I knew there was something wrong with that. ??

Cool! Glad you got it working ??