Wordpress : set a custom field in archive based on ACF date

Question

I created a custom field ACF named "date_dexpiration" with format : d/m/Y H:i

When I create a new post with no expiration date, the field "date_dexpiration" is not fullfilled and stays empty.

I want in an archive (created with elementor posts widget) set a custom filter in order to hide all the posts with a date "date_dexpiration" < today. I wrote this code inserted in function.php

add_action( 'elementor/query/filter_expiration_date', function( $query ) {
    $today = date('d/m/Y H:i');
    $meta_query = $query->get( 'meta_query' );
    $meta_query = [
        [       
        'key'       => 'date_dexpiration', 
        'value'     => $today,
        'compare'   => '>=',
        ]
    ];
    $query->set( 'meta_query', $meta_query );
} );

It doesn't work:

• all the posts with empty field "date_dexpiration" aren't displayed
• all the field with filled field "date_dexpiration" aren't displayed

Can you help me please to debug this code.

Answer 1

ACF default format for date fields is Ymd so you need to convert $today to Ymd format. Try this below code.

add_action( 'elementor/query/filter_filter_expiration_date', function( $query ) {
    $today = date('d/m/Y H:i');
    $today = date( 'Ymd', strtotime( $today ) );
    $meta_query = $query->get( 'meta_query' );
    $meta_query = [
        [       
        'key'       => 'date_dexpiration', 
        'value'     => $today,
        'compare'   => '>=',
        ]
    ];
    $query->set( 'meta_query', $meta_query );
} );

Answer 2

Thank you for your answer. I had to change a bit the code you gave. Here is my last version:

add_action( 'elementor/query/filter_expiration_date', function( $query ) {
        $today = date('Ymd');
        $meta_query = $query->get( 'meta_query' );
        $meta_query = [
            [       
            'key'       => 'date_dexpiration', 
            'value'     => $today,
            'type'      => 'DATE',
            'compare'   => '>=',
            ]
        ];
        $query->set( 'meta_query', $meta_query );
} );

It works fine when the ACF fieeld is fullfilled (for expired and not expired values), but not works when the field is not fullfilled or doesn't exist for a post. These posts are not displayed.

I tried:

if( get_field('date_dexpiration') ) ...

but doesn't work!

Do you know how to keep the first filter and had the other filter for all the non fullfilled items.

Thank you again.