Question

At the moment I have a really basic PHP script for randomly drawing quotes from a text file.

<?php include('testimonials.txt');
  srand ((double) microtime() * 100000);
  $random_number = rand(0,count($quotes)-1);
  echo ($quotes[$random_number]);
?>

Of course currently the script executes every time the page loads and brings up new content each time the page is refreshed.

I want to know is there any easy way to modify this to change the content on a timer, so it only changes once a day, or every few days?

If it requires altering the wp-cron.php of my site, any idea what I would need to put in there to do so?

Thank you

Answer 1

You can start with something as basic as this, which saves the id of a quote and the time it was picked in a file:

<?php
$cachefile = './current_t_id';
$time = $id = null; // assume we have no cached quote
$change_every = 3600; // seconds
include('testimonials.txt');

// if cached quote exists, load it
if(is_file($cachefile)) {
    list($time, $id) = explode(' ', file_get_contents($cachefile));
}

// if no cached quote or duration expired, change it
if(!$time || time() - $time > $change_every) {
    srand ((double) microtime() * 100000);
    $id = rand(0,count($quotes)-1);
    file_put_contents($cachefile, time().' '.$id); // update cache
}

// echo the quote, be it cached or freshly picked 
echo ($quotes[$id]);

There are several things that can be improved here (e.g. error handling, the possibility of the testimonials file changing in a way that makes the cached quote invalid, etc) but the basic idea should be apparent.