In Part 1 of this tutorial, we explained how to use widgets in WordPress and in Part 2, we explained how to configure text widgets.
In this tutorial you are going to learn how to configure other WordPress widgets.
Add A Post Categories Section To The Sidebar
Now that you have configure a text widget containing a support button, let’s configure your Post Categories.
The Categories widget already displays on your sidebar area by default. All you need to do, therefore, is place this widget wherever you want your categories to display by clicking and dragging it in the sidebar area …
(WordPress Post Categories widget)
your post categories …
(Post Categories)
Note: We are currently putting together tutorials on using categories in WordPress.
Configure your Categories widget settings as shown below:
- In Title: type something that visitors will understand, for example, “Choose A Topic…” (1)
- Check Display as dropdown if you have too many categories (this significantly reduces the size of the widget 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 unchecked. (2)
- Leave the remaining options unchecked, or see the additional notes on configuring this widget below.
- Click Save when finished …
(Configuring a Categories widget)
Load the site in your web browser or reload the page to see how the Categories widget will look to blog readers …
(WordPress Categories widget added to sidebar menu)
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 Area
The Recent Posts widget displays in your sidebar section by default. All you need to do is configure your widget.
Click on the Recent Posts widget title bar to display the configuration settings …
(Recent Posts WordPress widget)
There’s really very little to set up. You can add a title, select the number of posts to display and display post dates. If you’re happy to use the default setting for Number of posts to show, then just leave the widget as is, otherwise enter a number of posts to show and click Save …
(Recent Posts widget settings)
The most recent number of posts you have specified will display on the sidebar …
(Recent Posts widget displayed on sidebar navigation area)
We provide a step-by-step tutorial about how to create a post in WordPress here: How To Create A New WP Post
Adding A Pages Widget To Your Blog Sidebar
Next, we’ll add a widget to your sidebar navigation menu to display page links.
Find a Pages widget in the Available Widgets section …
(Pages Widget)
Drag the Pages widget to your sidebar widget area …
(Adding a Pages widget to the sidebar navigation area)
The Pages widget lets you configure the following settings:
- Title: Add a title to display above your links (e.g. “Useful Pages“) (1)
- Sort by: Sort how your pages display: by title (i.e. alphabetically), by page order, or by page ID. (2)
- Exclude: Use this setting to hide pages on the sidebar menu (3) …
(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 in the Sort by: drop-down menu …
(Pages Widget settings – sorting options)
To exclude pages from showing on your widget, type in the Page Ids for the pages you would like excluded separated by commas into the Exclude field …
(Pages Widget settings – exclude pages)
How to find a page ID in WordPress is covered in this tutorial: How To Locate The Unique ID Of Any WordPress Page Or Post
Click the Save button when finished and click Close at the bottom of the widget box to minimize the widget.
Links to the blog’s pages will now show in your sidebar …
(WordPress Pages Widget on sidebar)
Tip: You can add multiple Pages widgets to the sidebar. This is helpful if you would like to display separate groups of pages on your sidebar (e.g. “Products”, “Legal Pages” etc.)
Add Links To The Blog Sidebar
Next, we’ll add a Links widget to display external links on your WordPress sidebar navigation section.
Before adding a Links widget to the sidebar, we recommend configuring the Links section inside your dashboard first …
(WordPress Links section)
Note: We plan to create tutorials on how to configure and use the WordPress Links feature.
To add the widget, select a Links widget in the Available Widgets section …
(WordPress Links Widget)
Drag the Links widget to your sidebar 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 menu …
(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 Your 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 your Links Widget, click the Save button …
(Links added to 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 your WordPress sidebar.
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This is the end of section 3 of this tutorial series.
Click on this link to keep reading:
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