Only Limited Number Of Posts Show

Where did you put the widget dude? Is it in a theme template? If so, allow me to explain a little bit about that custom code.

// Defining widget options.
$args = array(
    'post_limit'       => 5,
    'post_random'      => 'yes',
    'category_include' => 1,2,4,5,7
);

// Function call.
special_recent_posts($args);
?>

You can actually customize the array as you like. The options are below:

// Change widget title (default: 'special recent posts')
'widget_title' => text

// Display thumbnails? (default: 'yes')
'display_thumbnail' => 'yes' | 'no'

// Hide widget title? (default 'no')
'widget_title_hide' => 'no'

// Set thumbnail width (default 100)
'thumbnail_width' => digit

// Set thumbnail height (default 100)
'thumbnail_height' => digit

// Link thumbnails to post? (default: 'yes')
'thumbnail_link' => yes' | 'no'

// Set thumbnail rotation mode (default 'no')
'thumbnail_rotation' => 'no|cw|ccw'

// Set default displayed post types (default: 'post')
'post_type' => 'post' | 'page

// Set default displayed post status (default: 'publish')
'post_status' => 'publish' | 'private' | 'inherit' | 'pending' | 'future' | 'draft' | 'trash'

 // Set max number of posts to display (default: 5)
'post_limit' => digit

// Set displayed post content type (default: 'content')
'post_content_type' => 'content' | 'excerpt'

// Set displayed post content length (default: 100)
'post_content_length' => digit

// Set displayed post content length mode (default: 'chars')
'post_content_length_mode' => chars|words|fullcontent

// Set displayed post title length (default 100)
'post_title_length' => digit

// Set displayed post title length mode (default: 'chars')
'post_title_length_mode' => chars|words|fulltitle

// Set post order (default: 'DESC')
'post_order' => 'DESC' | 'ASC

// Set post offset (default: 0)
'post_offset' => digit

// Set random mode (default: 'no')
'post_random' => 'no' | 'yes'

// Hide current post from visualization when in single post view? (default: 'yes')
'post_current_hide' => 'yes' | 'no'

// Set layout content mode (default: 'titleexcerpt')
'post_content_mode' => 'titleexcerpt' | 'titleonly'

// Display post date? (default: 'yes')
'post_date' => 'yes' | 'no'

// Filter posts by including post IDs (default: none)
'post_include' => comma separated list of digits

// Exclude posts from visualization by IDs (default: none)
'post_exclude' => comma separated list of digits

// Filter post by Custom Post Type (default: none)
'custom_post_type' => comma separated list of custom post types

// Set the default 'No posts available' text (default: 'No posts available')
'noposts_text' => text

// Set allowed tags to display in the excerpt visualization.
'allowed_tags' => blankspace separated list of html tags

// Set string break text (default: [...])
'string_break' => text

// Set path to optional image string break.
'image_string_break' => text

// Link (image)string break to post?
'string_break_link'  => 'yes' | 'no

// Set post date format. (default: 'F jS, Y')
'date_format' => text

// Filter posts by including categories IDs. (default: none)
'category_include' => comma separated list of digits

// When filtering by caqtegories, switch the widget title to a linked category title (default: 'no')
'category_title' => 'no', 'yes'

// Add the 'no-follow' attribute to all widget links.
'nofollow_links' => 'no' | 'yes'

I’m using the shortcode implementation of SRP 1.9.8, and I have the same problem –

[srp widget_title_hide=’yes’ post_random=’yes’ display_thumbnail=’no’ post_content_mode=’titleonly’ post_date=’no’]

which in theory should default to a display of 5 posts selected at random from my entire post archive, barring the current one if in a single post view. However, yes it picks 5 posts to display, but always from what seems to be a very restricted number of more recent posts. I’ve only got around 80 odd posts, so would expect to see some of the older ones crop up in a truly random selection quite regularly, but they never do. I just seem to get the same ones from this ‘restricted’ number of posts cropping up far too regularly, even if they are listed in a random order.

BTW I’ve tried using the widget version of SRP, but it makes no difference as the result is the same.

I think therefore that the process of ‘randomly’ selecting posts from the database is nowhere near as random as it should be.