Query to display one sticky post followed by regular posts

[Darice]

I have been fighting with this piece of code to get the query to show one sticky post on top if there is one, followed by 6 regular posts. I really want this done with one loop, but so far I have only seen two loops solutions.

     <?
    global $getnews;
    
                if ( is_user_logged_in() ) { //display post for admins

                    $getnews =  new WP_Query('cat=21&post_status=future&post_status=published&posts_per_page=6&orderby=date&order=DESC');
    
                } else { //display post for visitors
                   

$args = array (
	'post_type'              => 'post',
	'cat'                    => '21',
	'posts_per_page'         => '6',
	'ignore_sticky_posts'    => true,
	'order'                  => 'DESC'
);
  
    
    $getnews = new WP_Query( $args );
                }
    
    ?>

The above query in the else brackets shows regular posts only and no sticky on top.

I tried with post__in(); also and with that it only showed the sticky post with no regular post.

Anyone has and idea what I’m doing wrong or if it is even possible what I want to do?

[DaveMaxwell]

@Darice

‘ignore_sticky_posts’ => true,

I’m not super keen on how WP works, but I would guess this line is why you’re not getting stickied posts.

[Darice]

That is what I thought too but the WordPress Codex and http://generatewp.com say to put it to true or 1. I tried setting it to false or 0, still nothing.

[Darice]

No one has any other ideas about this sticky post issue?