Assistance Needed With Custom Author Pages & Dealing With Author Slug Issues

Hi there,

in this doc we show how to use static pages for category archives.
https://docs.wpshowposts.com/article/use-static-pages-as-category-archives/

And we can change that code so it applies to author archives.

Try this:

add_filter('request', function( array $query_vars ) {
    if ( is_admin() ) {
        return $query_vars;
    }

    if ( isset( $query_vars['author_name'] ) ) {
        $pagename = $query_vars['author_name'];

        $query_vars = array( 'pagename' => "$pagename" );
    }

    return $query_vars;
} );

Then you just need to create a static page that has the same name as the author.

Hi David and thanks a lot. That seems to work partially, at least on the author page end. :)

Unfortunately, I end up with two different "author list" base URLs: Wordpress (author box link, etc.) has /author/xxx/ while in reality, I have /authors/xxx/ for page structure.

If I change the slug base /author/ to /authors/ by the Edit Author Slug plugin in an attempt to be consistent I'm back at getting a 404 again.

Thank you!

How did you change the /author to /authors for the archive ?

Hi David. My apology if I wasn't clear when I mentioned it above, but it's the Edit Author Slug plugin I used as I don't currently know how to do so otherwise.

What happens if you try rebuilding the permalinks?
To do that, go to Settings > Peramlinks and click Save Changes

I've tried that and unfortunately I still ended up with the 404 page. :(

Any chance you can ask the Edit Author Slug plugin developer ?
As i am not sure how to accomplish the query vars change to use a static page if that plugin has rewritten the permalink.

I use this plugin. Did these setting options not work for you?

The issue here Scot is:

https://generatepress.com/forums/topic/assistance-needed-with-custom-author-pages-dealing-with-author-slug-issues/#post-2503804

We are trying to rewrite the query_vars so it retrieves the static page of the same name as the category.
Problem is the default author_name is author.
Whereas Marty has renamed his to authors

If you have any ideas - it would be good to hear.

The Author Base can be changed to “authors” for the default “slug”. Further down that page (not shown) a custom display name can be entered for the user so the “page” would be accesses at /authors/customdisplayname/

So unless I’m not getting what we’re trying to achieve I think the simple way works.

Anyway, I’ll defer and follow. 😊

Yeah, i believe the OP has set that option. It just won't allow my code to work with it :)

(deleted, to revise)

@Scott @David, thank you both.

David, couldn't the GP author box code be modified as a workaround? The WP author bio link in the author box by default will be /author/. If I could change that to /xxxx/ (/authors/ for example) it would work, I believe.

This is the author URL PHP code portion from this thread:

<div class="author-links">
 
            <a href="<?php echo get_author_posts_url( get_the_author_meta( 'ID' ) ); ?>" title="Read more">
                ...
            </a>
 
        </div>

I wasn't able to figure out how to modify this. Thank you again!

This line:

<a href="<?php echo get_author_posts_url( get_the_author_meta( 'ID' ) ); ?>" title="Read more">

Try replacing with:

<?php
$author_url = get_author_posts_url( get_the_author_meta( 'ID' ) );
$new_author_url = str_replace( 'author', 'authors' , esc_url( $author_url) );
?>
<a href="<?php echo $new_author_url; ?>" title="Read more">