In Part 1 of this tutorial series, we explained how to use WordPress widgets and in Part 2, you learned how to configure a text widget.
In this section you will learn how to configure other commonly-used WordPress blog widgets.
Add Post Categories
Now that you know how to configure a text widget containing a help button, let’s configure a widget to display Post Categories.
By default, the Categories widget already displays on your sidebar section. All you need to do, therefore, is place this widget wherever you want your post categories to display by clicking and dragging it on the sidebar widget area …
(Post Categories widget)
your post categories …
(Post Categories)
Note: We plan to provide separate tutorials about how to use categories.
Configure your categories settings as described below:
- In Title: type something that blog readers will understand, for example, “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- If you plan to use several categories, check Display as dropdown (this significantly reduces the length of your content by displaying all categories in a drop-down menu). If you plan to publish posts under a few categories only, then leave the Display as dropdown box unticked. (2)
- Leave the default settings for the remaining options, or see the additional notes on configuring the Categories widget below.
- Click Save to update your settings …
(Configuring a WordPress Categories widget)
Load the site in your web browser or reload the page to see how your content will display to blog readers …
(WordPress Categories widget added to sidebar)
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 box, otherwise leave this box unticked.
- To display the number of posts published in each category on your site, enable the Show post counts check box …
(Category widget options – Post Count Enabled vs Post Count Disabled)
Add Recent Posts To The Sidebar
The Recent Posts widget displays on your sidebar by default. All you need to do is configure this widget.
Click on your Recent Posts widget title bar to configure its settings …
(Recent Posts widget)
There’s very little to set up here. You can add a title if you want, select the number of posts to display and opt to display post dates. If you want to use the default setting for Number of posts to show, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise change the number of posts and click Save …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget settings)
The number of posts you have specified will display on your sidebar …
(Recent Posts widget added to blog sidebar)
A tutorial is provided on creating and editing posts in WordPress here: How To Create A WP Post
Add Links To Your Site’s Main Pages In The WordPress Sidebar
Next, let’s add a widget to your sidebar navigation section to display page links.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your widget section …
(Adding a Pages widget to the sidebar)
The Pages widget allows you to configure the following settings:
- Title: Add a title to display above your links (e.g. “Site Information“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or by page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Hide selected pages on the sidebar (3) …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings)
By default, pages are displayed by title in alphabetical order. If you want to display pages using another option, then select a different method from the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(WordPress Pages Widget settings – item sorting options)
To exclude pages from showing in the sidebar, enter the Page Ids for all the pages you want to exclude separated by commas into the Exclude field …
(Pages Widget settings – excluding pages)
How to find a WordPress page ID is explained here: How To Find The Unique ID Of WordPress Posts And Pages
Click the Save button when done and then click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize your widget.
Links to the main pages will now appear in your sidebar …
(Pages Widget on sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to the sidebar. This is helpful if you want to display separate groups of pages on your sidebar section (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Add A Links Widget
Now, let’s add a widget to your WordPress sidebar navigation area for displaying links to external resources.
Before adding a Links widget to your sidebar, you will first need to configure your Links feature inside your WordPress dashboard …
(WordPress Links screen)
Note: Setting up the WordPress Links feature will be explained in other tutorials.
To add the widget, select a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Links Widget)
Drag the Links widget to your active area …
(Making Links Widget active)
The Links 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 your sidebar 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 WordPress Links Widgets To The Sidebar Menu)
You can sort links by Link title, Link rating, Link ID, or display links in Random order …
(WordPress 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 to update your settings. Your links will become immediately visible on your sidebar …
(Links added to sidebar)
As the above example shows, you can display specific external links to your site visitors (e.g. a list for a specific link category only), and add multiple link lists to the sidebar section.
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This is the end of part 3 of this series of tutorials.
Click on this link to view Part 4:
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"This is an awesome training series. I have a pretty good understanding of WordPress already, but this is helping me to move somewhere from intermediate to advanced user!" - Kim Lednum