Randomise X most recent wordpress posts - php

Question

I've got the following code which will display 4 random posts from the defined category. However, that's a little too random, I need it to display the 4 most recent, and then randomise them in particular each time the page is refreshed.
Otherwise I just end up getting articles which could date back over 2 years ago appear on the homepage.
<div class="article-block-v1">
<?php
//get terms (category ids 11,2,33,34), then display one post in each term
$taxonomy = 'category';// e.g. post_tag, category
$param_type = 'category__in'; // e.g. tag__in, category__in
$term_args=array(
'include' => '1459',
);
$terms = get_terms($taxonomy,$term_args);
if ($terms) {
foreach( $terms as $term ) {
$args=array(
"$param_type" => array($term->term_id),
'post_type' => 'post',
'post_status' => 'publish',
'posts_per_page' => 4,
'orderby' => 'rand',
);
$my_query = null;
$my_query = new WP_Query($args);
$i = 1;
if( $my_query->have_posts() ) {
echo '<ul>';
while ($my_query->have_posts()) : $my_query->the_post(); ?>
<?php if ($i == 1): ?>
<div class="article-block-v1">
<div class="category-label-large category-news-analysis">
<p><?php echo $term->name; ?></p>
</div>
<div class="view2 third-effect">
<?php the_post_thumbnail(); ?>
<div class="mask">
</i>
</div>
</div>
<ul class="homepagewhitebg">
<li><h5><?php the_title(); ?></h5></li>
</ul>
</div>
<?php else: ?>
<li><p><?php the_title(); ?></p></li>
<?php endif; ?>
<?php
$i++;
endwhile;
echo '</ul>';
}
}
}
wp_reset_query(); // Restore global post data stomped by the_post().
?>
Demo 1 (4 Most Recent) - Regular without random orderby
Article #1001
Article #1002
Article #1003
Article #1004
Demo 2 (4 Most Recent - But with order by random on those 4)
Article #1003
Article #1001
Article #1004
Article #1002
UPDATE
I'm also trying this now, however it's not taking into account the category I've defined, nor is it randomising across the 4 displayed:
<div class="article-block-v1">
<?php
$number = "4";
$posts = "SELECT * from $wpdb->posts WHERE post_type='post' ORDER BY post_date DESC LIMIT $number";
$postX = array();
$postresult = mysql_query($posts) or die(mysql_error());
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($postresult)) {
$postX[] = $row[0];
}
$ids = shuffle($postX);
$ids = implode(',', $postX);
echo $ids;
?>
<?php
$args = array(
'posts_per_page'=> $number,
'post__in' => explode(',', $ids),
'include' => '1451',
'orderby' => 'rand'
);
query_posts($args);
?>
<?php while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
<li><?php the_title(); ?></li>
<?php endwhile; ?>

Answer 1

You can use shuffle(). You're going to want to get the 4 most recent posts (in order) before shuffling them. Quite simply, you could do something like the following:
// Get the 4 most recent posts
$args = array( 'numberposts' => 4 );
$recent_posts = wp_get_recent_posts( $args );
// Shuffle them
shuffle($recent_posts)
foreach( $recent_posts as $recent ){
// Do something with the $recent post
}
You may need to pass additional $args to the function, for your specific constraints.