Before creating new post programmatically I want to check if there is a post with the same headline in my database.
I am checking that like this:
$results = $wpdb->get_results("SELECT COUNT(*) FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_type = 'candidates' AND post_title = '$name'");
Example of value I get when I var_dump($results):
array(1) { [0]=> object(stdClass)#85 (1) { ["COUNT(*)"]=> string(1) "8" } }
Now I want to get that string(1) "8", add it to variable and convert it to number, but I am not sure how to get it.
I tried something like
$number = (int)$results[0]->COUNT(*)
but that isn't right. I also tried some other combinations but couldn't figure it out
Your very problem is the (*) in $number = (int)$results[0]->COUNT(*). You cannot use these special characters simply as 'variable'. You're better off using a column alias using AS your_column_alias.
So you want to use
SELECT COUNT(*) as post_count FROM $wpdb->posts WHERE post_type = 'candidates' AND post_title = '$name'
as query and
$number = (int) $results[0]->post_count;
to fetch the aliased column from your resultset.