In Part 1 of this step-by-step tutorial, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part 2, you learned how to configure text widgets.
In this tutorial we will continue configuring other sidebar widgets.
Add Categories
Now that you have configure a text widget containing a clickable help button, let’s configure Categories.
The Categories widget displays on your sidebar menu by default. All you need to do, therefore, is place the widget wherever you want your post categories to display by clicking and dragging it in the sidebar area …
(WordPress Categories widget)
Before adding a Categories widget to your sidebar navigation section, you will first need to configure your categories inside the WP dashboard …
(Post Categories Panel)
Note: We are currently putting together tutorials on configuring and using post categories in WordPress.
Configure your Categories widget settings as shown below:
- In Title: type something that will make sense to visitors, like “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- Check Display as dropdown if you plan to have many categories (this significantly reduces the size of your widget content by displaying all categories inside a drop-down menu). Leave the box unchecked if you want a list of all categories to display on the sidebar navigation area. (2)
- You can leave the remaining options as the default, or see the additional notes on configuring the Categories widget below.
- Click Save when done …
(Categories widget settings)
Load the site in your browser or refresh the page to see how your content will look to visitors …
(Categories widget added to sidebar navigation area)
Tips:
- Change the default Uncategorized post category to something more meaningful.
- If you use nested categories on your site, you may want to check the Show hierarchy option, otherwise leave this box unchecked.
- To display the number of posts published in each category, tick the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add Recent Posts
The Recent Posts widget typically shows on your sidebar menu by default. All you need to do is configure the widget.
Click on the Recent Posts title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget)
There’s very little to configure in this widget. You can add a widget title, select the number of posts to display and opt to display post dates. If you want to use the default Number of posts to show setting, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise change the number of posts and click Save when done …
(Recent Posts widget settings)
The number of posts you have specified will be listed on the sidebar …
(Recent Posts widget displayed on blog sidebar)
Creating and editing WordPress Posts is explained here: How To Create A New WordPress Post
Displaying Your Site’s Pages
Next, we’ll add a widget to your sidebar to display page links.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your active widget section …
(Adding a Pages widget to the sidebar section)
The Pages widget allows you to configure the following settings:
- Title: Add a title to display above your links (e.g. “Pages“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Use this setting to hide pages on your sidebar navigation section (3) …
(Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages are displayed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using another option, then choose a different method in the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – sort options)
To exclude pages from showing to your visitors, type or paste in their Page Ids separated by commas into the Exclude field …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – exclude pages)
Finding a page ID in WordPress is covered here: Finding WordPress Page And Post IDs
Click the Save button when finished and click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize the widget.
Links to your main pages will now show on the sidebar …
(Pages Widget on sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to your sidebar navigation menu. This is handy if you need to display separate page groups on the sidebar area (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Display Links On Your Sidebar
Now, we’ll add a Links widget to your sidebar.
Before adding the Links widget to your sidebar, you should first configure the Links section inside the WP dashboard …
(WordPress Links screen)
Note: We plan to create tutorials on setting up the Links feature in WordPress.
To add the widget, find a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Links Widget)
Drag the widget to your active area …
(Making Links Widget active)
The widget offers a number of configurable options, including the ability to specify what information to show about your links and how many links you want to display on the sidebar …
(WordPress Links Widget Settings)
You can add as many separate ‘Link Widgets’ to the sidebar section as you want. As you will see in a moment, this lets you create and display specific lists of links on your site …
(Add Multiple Links Widgets To The Sidebar)
You can sort links by Link title, Link rating, Link ID, or display links in Random order …
(Links widget: ‘Sort by:’ drop-down menu)
You can also create and display a list of items for a specific category, by selecting a link category from the ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu …
( WordPress Links widget: ‘Select Link Category’ drop-down menu)
When you have finished configuring the Links Widget, click the Save button …
(Links added to WordPress sidebar)
As the above example shows, you can display specific links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple lists of links to the sidebar.
***
This is the end of part 3 of this tutorial series on using WordPress widgets.
Click on this link to continue:
***
"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now