get_the_author_link( bool $use_title_attr = true ): string
- Since
- 3.0.0, 7.0.0
- Source
wp-includes/author-template.php:241
Description
If the author has a home page set, return an HTML link, otherwise just return the author's name.
Compatibility
- WordPress
- since 7.0.0
- PHP
- 7.4–8.6-dev
- 6.7.7
- 6.8.8
- 6.9.7
- 7.0.4
- 7.1.0
Present in every tracked release (6.7.7 to 7.1.0), and compiles on PHP 7.4 through 8.6-dev.
Parameters
$use_title_attrbooloptional- Whether to add a title attribute.
Default true.Default:true
Return value
string- An HTML link if the author's URL exists in user meta, otherwise the result of get_the_author().
Performance profile
How much work a call to get_the_author_link() does, and what it touches: the algorithmic scaling, the Zend instruction count per call across PHP versions, the hooks it hands control to, and the core code that calls it. Measured from the compiled opcodes, not a stopwatch, so every number is identical on any machine running the same PHP version, and every function in core is ranked by cost.
- Cost class
- Trivial
- Scaling
- Constant
- Instructions
- 8–45
- Plugin surface
- 1 hook
- Called by
- 1
Touches nothing outside its own arguments.
No loop in the body: the same number of instructions runs whatever you pass in.
Executed per call on PHP 8.5, depending on the branch taken. The body compiles to 49.
Third-party callbacks on 'the_author_link' run inside this call, and their cost is not bounded by anything here.
1 place in core call this, so the cost is paid more often than your own code shows.
What it touches
- hookthird-party callbacks
apply_filters()called directly
Further down the call graph this can also reach query, option, cache, serialize and transient. Those are the worst case, several calls deep and usually down an error path, not what a normal call pays.
What one call costs · 3 distinct outcomes
One number would be a lie: the work depends on which branch runs. These are every distinct cost get_the_author_link() can have, taken from its control-flow graph on PHP 8.5.
| When | Instructions | Calls it makes |
|---|---|---|
!get_the_author_meta() | 8 | get_the_author_meta(), get_the_author() |
get_the_author_meta() | 40 | get_the_author_meta(), get_the_author_meta(), get_the_author(), __(), sprintf(), esc_url(), sprintf(), apply_filters() |
get_the_author_meta() | 45 | get_the_author_meta(), get_the_author_meta(), get_the_author(), __(), sprintf(), esc_url(), esc_attr(), sprintf(), apply_filters() |
Across PHP versions
| PHP | Compiled | Executed | Branches | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8.6-dev | 49 | 8–45 | 2 | |
| 8.5 | 49 | 8–45 | 2 | |
| 8.4 | 49 | 8–45 | 2 | |
| 8.3 | 49 | 8–45 | 2 | |
| 8.2 | 49 | 8–45 | 2 | |
| 8.1 | 49 | 8–45 | 2 | 1 fewer instruction than PHP 7.4 |
| 7.4 | 50 | 8–46 | 2 |
An instruction is not a fixed amount of time, so a matching count is not necessarily the same speed; what it rules out is a difference in the work itself.
Hooks and filters fired · 1
One hook fires while get_the_author_link() runs, in this order:
Uses · 6
- get_the_author_meta()Retrieves the requested data of the author of the current post.
- get_the_author()Retrieves the author of the current post.
- __()Retrieves the translation of $text.
- esc_url()Checks and cleans a URL.
- esc_attr()Escaping for HTML attributes.
- apply_filters()Calls the callback functions that have been added to a filter hook.
Used by · 1
- the_author_link()Displays either author's link or author's name.
Source code
function get_the_author_link( $use_title_attr = true ) { if ( get_the_author_meta( 'url' ) ) { global $authordata; $author_url = get_the_author_meta( 'url' ); $author_display_name = get_the_author(); /* translators: %s: Author's display name. */ $author_title = sprintf( __( 'Visit %s’s website' ), $author_display_name ); $link = sprintf( '<a href="%1$s"%2$s rel="author external">%3$s</a>', esc_url( $author_url ), $use_title_attr ? ' title="' . esc_attr( $author_title ) . '"' : '', $author_display_name ); /** * Filters the author URL link HTML. * * @since 6.0.0 * * @param string $link The default rendered author HTML link. * @param string $author_url Author's URL. * @param WP_User $authordata Author user data. */ return apply_filters( 'the_author_link', $link, $author_url, $authordata ); } else { return get_the_author(); }}Changelog
Introduced in 3.0.0. One change between 6.7.7 and 7.1.0.
Signature, return type and hooks compared across 5 parsed releases.
$use_title_attr added.verified against source$use_title_attr parameter.from the docblockAbout this page
- Parsed data
- Generated from the wordpress-develop 7.1.0 tag, from
src/wp-includes/author-template.php, and regenerated for each WordPress release so it tracks the code rather than a snapshot of it. - Corrections
- Something wrong on this page? Report it and it gets fixed in the next regeneration.