Title: Show second tag
Last modified: August 21, 2016

---

# Show second tag

 *  [mrfraz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mrfraz/)
 * (@mrfraz)
 * [13 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/show-second-tag/)
 * I have a code-snippet on my site to show the last second tag.
 *     ```
       <?php
       $posttags = get_the_tags();
       $count=0;
       if ($posttags) {
         foreach($posttags as $tag) {
           $count++;
           if (2 == $count) {
       	echo '<a href="http://www.xyz.com/' . $tag->slug . '" alt="' . $tag->name . '" title="' . $tag->name . '">' . $tag->name . '</a>';
           }
         }
       }
       ?>
       ```
   
 * i include this.. on the tag-page..
 * 18 sites… and on one… it is the wrong tag.
    i can’t find the bug… is it in the
   database?
 * thanks for help.

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

 *  Moderator [bcworkz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/bcworkz/)
 * (@bcworkz)
 * [13 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/show-second-tag/#post-4025604)
 * Hello again! Your code is fine. The issue is indirectly the database, but it’s
   not a bug.
 * In practical terms, you cannot reliably expect `get_the_tags()` to return tags
   in a particular order. When you freshly add tags in order, you typically get 
   tags in the order you want, but if any changes are made to the tags, the resulting
   order is unpredictable.
 * Actually, the order is predictable, just not that useful. I believe the order
   is the order the tags appear in the terms table. You cannot specify any different
   order with `get_the_tags()`. That function does use a lower level function to
   get tag terms, and that function can accept orderby arguments. That function 
   is `wp_get_object_terms()`. Even so, the columns available to orderby are limited,
   so this may be of little benefit.
 * IMO, attempting to convey extra meaning in the order of the tags is not a good
   concept.
 * Incidentally FYI, you don’t need to run a loop to get the second element of an
   array. You could get rid of the loop and on the echo line replace each `$tag`
   occurrence with `$posttags[1]` and get the same result more efficiently.
 *  Thread Starter [mrfraz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/mrfraz/)
 * (@mrfraz)
 * [13 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/show-second-tag/#post-4025638)
 * uuh.. i don’t understand all 🙂
    can i do a hotfix… for this tag?
 * i have only on one.. page this (bug).
 * or how can is fix it?
 * thanks!
 *  Moderator [bcworkz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/bcworkz/)
 * (@bcworkz)
 * [13 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/show-second-tag/#post-4025645)
 * You can manually edit the database via phpMyAdminn so that the desired tag is
   placed such that it is the second tag found for that particular query. This can
   be quite dangerous as more than one table is involved, with a confusing relationship
   between them. If not done correctly, you could break all the term references.
   I encourage you to NOT try this, I only provide this as information since you
   asked. If you do try anyway, be sure to backup your database first.
 * If the tags are not used elsewhere, you could try deleting them, then reinsert
   them in the correct order. This method may not always work right.
 * Attempting to convey special meaning to the second tag is not a good approach.
   A better approach may be to create a custom hierarchical taxonomy where these
   important tags can all be children of a particular term.

Viewing 3 replies - 1 through 3 (of 3 total)

The topic ‘Show second tag’ is closed to new replies.

 * In: [Hacks](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/plugins-and-hacks/hacks/)
 * 3 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [bcworkz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/bcworkz/)
 * Last activity: [13 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/show-second-tag/#post-4025645)
 * Status: not resolved

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