wordpress query based on meta value - custom-post-type

Question

Im working on a site and build a custom post type. Within this custom post type I added a meta field where you can select a number from 1 trough 16. These numbers are corresponding with specific positions on my homepage. But now my issue appears. How can I query these post within these specific positions without repeating myself.
So for example...
here a post with meta value 1
here a post with meta value 2
here a post with meta value 3
ect..
Hope someone can help me a little

Answer 1

There are a few ways to tackle this depending on how complex your layout logic is. If you basically just need to loop through the 16 posts in order, you can use the orderby parameter in your query to sort the posts:
$args = array(
'post-type' => 'YOUR_POST_TYPE',
'orderby' => 'meta_value_num',
'meta_key' => 'YOUR_METAFIELD_SLUG'
);
$customposts = new WP_Query($args);
while( $customposts->have_posts() ): $customposts->the_post();
// loop goes here
If you need something more complex, you might be able to avoid repeating queries by querying once and then using conditionals to check the meta value. For example, with the query from the above example...
// Position 1 on your page
<div class="position-1">
<?php
while( $customposts->have_posts() ): $customposts->the_post();
$meta_value = get_post_meta(get_the_ID(), 'YOUR_METAFIELD_SLUG', true);
// Only print something here if the meta value is what we want
if( $meta_value == 1 ) :
the_title();
the_content();
endif;
// Reset the loop
$customposts->rewind_posts(); ?>
</div>
// Position 2 on your page
<div class="position-2">
<?php
while( $customposts->have_posts() ): $customposts->the_post();
$meta_value = get_post_meta(get_the_ID(), 'YOUR_METAFIELD_SLUG', true);
if( $meta_value == 2 ) :
the_title();
the_content();
endif;
// Reset the loop again
$customposts->rewind_posts(); ?>
....and so on.
You may find these helpful:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/get_post_meta
http://codex.wordpress.org/Class_Reference/WP_Query