This WordPress plugin creates a list of links to the most recently updated pages and posts on any WP website. The following image is a screen shot of the widget output. I am running this widget on this website, so forget the screen shot. Look at the sidebar on this page and you will find the widget itself.
Install this plugin
- Download recently-updated-pages-and-posts.zip
- Decompress the file contents
- Upload the recently-updated-pages-and-posts folder to a WordPress plugins directory (/wp-content/plugins)
- Activate the plugin from the Administration Dashboard
- Open the Widgets page under the Appearance section
- Drag the Recently updated widget to the active sidebar
- Configure the widget options to suit your needs and click Save
Sample HTML output
Styling the output with CSS
/* reference the list by id */
#recently-updated-widget-list{ list-style: disc; }
/* apply style to all of the list items */
.recently-updated-widget-item{ margin-left: 25px; }
/* make the first list item font size larger */
#ruwi-0{ font-size: 125%; }
WordPress.org plugin page
Visit this plugin’s page in the official WordPress Plugin Directory.
Here is some code I hacked together to display a list of recently updated pages and posts on a WordPress site:
<?php
$today = current_time('mysql', 1);
$howMany = 5;
if ( $recentposts = $wpdb->get_results("SELECT ID, post_title FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_status = 'publish' AND post_modified_gmt < '$today' ORDER BY post_modified_gmt DESC LIMIT $howMany")):
?>
<h2><?php _e("Recent Updates"); ?></h2>
<ul>
<?php
foreach ($recentposts as $post) {
if ($post->post_title == '') $post->post_title = sprintf(__('Post #%s'), $post->ID);
echo "<li><a href='".get_permalink($post->ID)."'>";
the_title();
echo '</a></li>';
}
?>
</ul>
<?php endif; ?>
The variable $howMany holds the number of items to display in the list. I used some code I found in a WordPress theme I am using on some website, and modified it to help someone in need of this specific solution.
Update 02/22/2010:
Including post excerpts
A commenter below asks, “Is it possible to combine the_excerpt(); with the code you provided?” The function you are naming is only useful inside “the loop,” but yes, including excerpts is easy. Try this:
<?php
$today = current_time('mysql', 1);
$howMany = 18;
if ( $recentposts = $wpdb->get_results("SELECT ID, post_title, post_excerpt FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_status = 'publish' AND post_modified_gmt < '$today' ORDER BY post_modified_gmt DESC LIMIT $howMany")):
?>
<h2><?php _e("Recent Updates"); ?></h2>
<ul>
<?php
foreach ($recentposts as $post) {
if ($post->post_title == '') $post->post_title = sprintf(__('Post #%s'), $post->ID);
echo "<li><a href='".get_permalink($post->ID)."'>";
the_title();
echo '</a><p>' . $post->post_excerpt . '</p></li>';
}
?>
</ul>
<?php endif; ?>