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What is the difference between ‘title_permalink’ and ‘url_title_path’ variables? They seem to have similar behaviour.

Hi MarkerMaker,

Thank you for posting your question here on the ExpressionEngine forums.

One uses a specific template, the other defaults to the site index. One uses the url title as a link while the other add the title for you, all you do is give it the template group and template.

From the docs…

title_permalink
This variable uses the “url title” as the link. It defaults to the site index with the “url title”

url_title_path
The URL to the specified template. The “url title” of the entry will be automatically added.

Cheers!

Thanks… Would you be able to give me real world example for when you would use both of these as I am still a little unclear?

Hey MarkerMaker,

Well actually, there’s no functional difference between the two. Looks like both have existed since ExpressionEngine 1, so let me check with the devs to see if there was a reason for having both variables.

Looks like one is simply a duplicate of another, added many years ago by an eager developer. We’ll need to deprecate one of the two, but since we have people using both on their sites, it’s a bit more of a process than it might look on the surface. My recommendation for you now is to pick whichever one makes the most sense to you and use that one consistently. How’s that sound?

Wow so I really both the same in principle. How does this sit with Shane’s comments? He seemed to think they were quite different.

Hey MarkerMaker,

They did appear to be different upon first look, but when digging into the code we found out otherwise!

Sorry about the confusion!

Cheers,

Thanks Shane.

Thanks to you MarkerMaker! We’d never have discovered this without you.

Have a good weekend!