A client recently requested that their ‘Members’ page be sorted by surname and not first name. The lists were generated using the follwing code:

<?php$cat_args = array(

'sort_column' => 'post_title',

'order' => 'ASC',

'parent' => 12);

$categories =   get_categories($cat_args);

foreach($categories as $category) {

echo '<ul id="member"><li><h3>' . $category->name.'</h3></li>';

$post_args = array(

'numberposts' => 50,

'orderby' => 'title',

'order' => 'ASC',

'category' => $category->term_id    );

$posts = get_posts($post_args);

foreach($posts as $post) {	?>

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

<?php the_title(); ?></a></li>	<?php	}

echo '</ul>';

}

?>

To sort by surname I created a custom field in the Post Edit screen. The name of the custom field I set to ‘surname’ and I entered the member’s surname in the value field.

I then had to change the PHP code to look for the custom field and sort the list accordingly. I changed the ‘orderby’ => ‘title’, to ‘orderby’ => ‘meta_value’,’meta_key’ => ‘surname’,.

Now the members are sorted by their surnames. Simple! View the code in action here.

Note: If the custom field of ‘surname’ is not given a value then the post title will not display in the list.