Samuel Coskey

This is another simple plugin to show a list of posts from your blog. 
Use the <code>[postlist]</code> shortcode on any post or page.
The shortcode supports several options:
<ul>
<li>
category: If defined, show posts only from this category. 
Specify the category using its slug identifier. If you provide 
multiple comma-seperated category slugs then they will all be 
included.
</li>
<li>
tag: If defined, show posts only from this tag. Specify the tag 
using its slug identifier. If you provide multiple comma-seperated 
tag slugs then they will all be included.
</li>
<li>
style: One of list (default) or post. If it 
is list, then the list style is indented and bulleted. If it is post 
then the title is promoted to <code><h2 class="upcoming-entry-title"></code> and 
the list style is plain.
</li>
<li>
text: One of none (default), excerpt, excerpt-formatted, 
or normal. If it is excerpt, then the post excerpt is shown, similar 
to search results. If it is normal then the full post (up to 
the <code>[more]</code> tag) is shown.
</li>
<li>
more_text: Specify the text to append onto truncated excerpts. 
Defaults to <code>...</code>.
</li>
<li>
null_text: If no results are returned, shows this text. 
Defaults to <code>(none)</code>.
</li>
<li>
class_name: If defined, adds this class name to the generated <code><ul></code> 
element. Useful for custom styling.
</li>
<li>
show_date: If defined, the post date will precede the post title.
</li>
<li>
date_format: If showing the date, this php date format will be 
used. The default is the Date Format value from the General Settings 
page. I recommend <code>"F j, Y"</code>, which displays as “May 12, 2012”.
</li>
<li>
q: Arbitrary &-separated arguments to add to the query. See the 
<a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Class_Reference/WP_Query/#Parameters" rel="nofollow ugc">WP_Query</a> 
page for available syntax. For example, to show only three posts and 
you want to show them in ascending instead of descending order, you would 
write <code>[postlist q="posts_per_page=3&order=ASC"]</code>.
</li>
</ul>
The output can then be further formatted using CSS. We recommend the 
plugin <a href="https://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/imporved-simpler-css/" rel="ugc">Improved Simpler 
CSS</a> for 
quickly styling your post list (and your site)!
This plugin can also be easily made into a widget by placing the shortcode 
into a text widget, and activating the <a href="https://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/shortcodes-in-sidebar/" rel="ugc">Shortcodes in 
sidebar</a> 
plugin.
Report bugs, give feedback, or fork this plugin on 
<a href="http://github.com/scoskey/Simple-post-listing-wordpress-plugin" rel="nofollow ugc">GitHub</a>.

Simple post listing

Use the [postlist] shortcode to show a list of posts.

Niraj Shah

This simple shortcode plugin allows you to list posts as a bulleted list linking to the full article. You can limit 
the list to posts from a specific category and you can select the number of posts to show. The <code>order</code> and 
 orderby options lets you sort the list too.
Usage is simple. Create a page or post and use the code <code>[showposts category="2" num="4"]</code> – this will show 
all 4 posts from category 2. Another example <code>[showposts category="1" num="-1" orderby="date" order="DESC"]</code> 
shows all the posts from category 1 ordered by the date (newest post first).
By default, only 5 posts are shown (unless you use the <code>num</code> option) and sorting in by date (oldest to newest).
<h3>Example</h3>
You can see two examples of the code working at the following links:
<ul>
<li>https://www.xtremeps3.com/ps5-firmware-history/</li>
<li>http://www.xtremeps3.com/firmware-history/</li>
<li>http://www.xtremeps3.com/faqs/</li>
</ul>
<h3>Usage</h3>
The shortcode is <code>[showposts]</code>
You can use the following parameters to customize what is displayed (all are optional):
<pre><code>[showposts category="2" num="4" order="DESC" orderby="date"]
</code></pre>
Set <code>order</code> to one of the following:
<ul>
<li><code>author</code> – Sort by the numeric author IDs.</li>
<li><code>category</code> – Sort by the numeric category IDs.</li>
<li><code>content</code> – Sort by content.</li>
<li><code>date</code> – Sort by creation date.</li>
<li><code>ID</code> – Sort by numeric post ID.</li>
<li><code>menu_order</code> – Sort by the menu order. Only useful with pages.</li>
<li><code>mime_type</code> – Sort by MIME type. Only useful with attachments.</li>
<li><code>modified</code> – Sort by last modified date.</li>
<li><code>name</code> – Sort by stub.</li>
<li><code>parent</code> – Sort by parent ID.</li>
<li><code>password</code> – Sort by password.</li>
<li><code>rand</code> – Randomly sort results.</li>
<li><code>status</code> – Sort by status.</li>
<li><code>title</code> – Sort by title.</li>
<li>
<code>type</code> – Sort by type.
orderby can be one the following:
</li>
<li>
DESC
</li>
<li>ASC</li>
</ul>

Show Post Shortcode

Shortcode to display posts as a bulleted list. You can also use parameters order and orderby to sort the list.

Simple post listing vs Show Post Shortcode