GigaOM Custom Post Type Factory

This is a convenience class and collection of methods to make creating new custom post types with their own metaboxes easy.

The general idea is to define a function that’s hooked to the register_post_types action. The function defines a class for your post type that extends the GO_Cpt class. This follows a design pattern established by the modern widgets API (as introduced in WP 2.8) https://codex.wordpress.org/Widgets_API#Developing_Widgets .

The result is a new custom post type and much easier creation and updating of custom meta associated with that post type. You’ll also have a convenient object you can use to access the metadata associated with each post.

function my_customposttype() {     class My_CustomPostType extends GO_Cpt     {         function __construct()         {             // execute the parent constructor with the name 
            // and definition for the custom post type             parent::__construct( $post_type_name , $post_type_definition );         }          function metabox( $post , $meta )         {             // print out the form here             // 
            // this method is optional, only use it if you want to 
            // add a metabox to your custom post type         }          function update( $new_meta , $old_meta )         {             // sanitize and validate the metadata             // then return $meta so it can be saved             //             // this method is required if a 
            // metabox() method is included          }     }      global $my_customposttype;     $my_customposttype = new My_CustomPostType; }  // hook that function to the register_post_types action add_action( 'register_post_types' , 'my_customposttype' ); 

Backstory: defining the post type class inside the function avoids issues with loading order and fatal errors resulting from attempting to extend a class that might not exist yet. Isn’t PHP awesome?

See the included hello world example: https://plugins.trac.wordpress.org/browser/go-cptfactory/trunk/example-helloworld-cpt.php

To access the meta associated with a post, you can call $my_customposttype->get_meta( $post_id );

You can easily add a method and hook to filter the_content or the_excerpt to insert custom values that may have been entered in the post meta. Simply add add_filter( 'the_content' , array( $this , 'the_content' )); in the __construct() and then define another method in the My_CustomPostType class such as:`

    function the_content( $content )     { 
        $meta_print = print_r( $this->get_meta( get_the_ID() ) , TRUE ); 
        return $meta_print . $content 
    } 

`

1. Place the plugin folder in your wp-content/plugins/ directory and activate it.
2. To actually use it, you’ll have to define a custom post type class. See more: https://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/go-cptfactory/

Q: Code is complex, is there an easier way to do this?

A: You should consinder Pods: http://podsframework.org

Q: If Pods is out there, why did you bother with this?

A: Pods is cool, but this keeps the problem in code, without any dependency on configuration information stored in the database. This also fits the architecture I like where the code related to a post type is associated with the post type definition. In my use, custom post type classes actually have many more methods to collect, validate, and display their data.