Wordpress: Using glob() returns an empty array

Question

I am trying to pull all images from a specified directory and then display them. I used the below piece of code in a regular website and it works

<?php $dirname = "images/tile/tile2/";
  $images = glob($dirname."*.jpg");

  foreach($images as $image) {
  echo '<li><img src="'.$image.'" /><br /></li>';
}?>

I have now moved this code and modified it to a wordpress site and I get an empty array.

<?php $dirname = get_template_directory_uri()."/images/tile/tile1/";
      $images = glob($dirname. "*.jpg"); 
      //$images = glob($dirname."*. {jpg}", GLOB_BRACE); - tried with GLOB_RACE
      foreach($images as $image) {
        echo '<li><img src="'.$image.'" /><br /></li>';
}?>

Second code

<?php define('ACCREDPATH', get_template_directory_uri() . '/images/tile/tile1/');
 $images = glob(ACCREDPATH. "*.jpg");
 //$images = glob(ACCREDPATH. "*. {jpg}", GLOB_BRACE); - tried with GLOB_RACE 
foreach($images as $image) {
   echo '<li><img src="'.$image.'" /><br /></li>';
}?>

• I have checked that the images are in the folder
• I have done a var_dump and I am getting the right path.
• var_dump on the glob($images) gives array(0){ }
• I have also looked for other threads with this issue and still nothing

Please any help would be useful.

Answer 1

glob works on a local path rather than a URL. The function needs to be able to access the server's filesystem which it can't do remotely (via URL).

http://php.net/manual/en/function.glob.php

The path you're providing in your working code is relative. It functions because it can be used as both a file path and a URL.

To achieve the same result with an absolute path to your theme you'll need to use get_template_directory(). In the example provided I'm using get_template_directory() to get the absolute path and get_template_directory_uri() to output as a URL.

Example:

$theme_img_path = '/images/tile/tile1/';
$images  = glob( get_template_directory() . $theme_img_path . '*.jpg' );

foreach ( $images as $image ) {

    // Convert the filename into an absolute URL.
    echo get_template_directory_uri() . $theme_img_path . basename( $image );
}

There's another issue in your second attempt that's worth pointing out. You can't use a function to set the value of a constant.