NOOBILICIOUS “How’d they do that?” question?

  • Hi, everybody, I need something cleared up for me about WordPress.
    From what I understand, when you want to convert a site into WP, you essentially have to break it up into the php components (index, header, sidebar, etc) and insert the appropriate css.

    Now my question is, if I choose a 3 column layout, do the additional pages I create in WP HAVE to follow the same template?
    Also, what if I want to change the sizes or numbers of columns for certain pages or have different feature images? Do I have to create a side bar php and somehow tell the page to get it?

    I believe this site was made in WP and does everything I’m trying to explain: https://www.populationmedia.org/. Could someone explain to me how they managed to do this? It pretty much follows the exact format I want for my site. I would really and TRULY appreciate any help with this. ??
    Thank you.

Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)

  • You sound like you would like to vary how your site looks from page to page. This is done with your themes templates.

    https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Templates
    https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Stepping_Into_Templates

    If you want three columns, you will want to specify that you need 2 sidebars

    sidebar1
    sidebar2

    https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Customizing_Your_Sidebar
    You will have to eventually put the WordPress dynamic include for your sidebar so you can put your widgets in each to make them unique.

    If your other page might only include 1 sidebar, you will have to make another content template and sidebar file. Then, for the page you want to apply the new template, there is a dropdown menu for you to select what template you want to use for it.

    Thread Starter voodazzed

    (@voodazzed)

    First of all, thank you so much for responding to my noob question. ??

    I’ll look at those links to clarify, but from what I understand, theoretically I could have each page set up on different templates with their own header content footer, etc and I would plug the html and css tags of the pages I designed into the appropriate areas like the original page?
    Would it be difficult to link the different templated pages together?

    Thanks again!

    Thread Starter voodazzed

    (@voodazzed)

    So each page would be a different template?

    It is not difficult to link different templates or child templates to your main theme.

    You simply have to include the files like if your footer or header or even sidebars are different from one page to the next. When you create your pages, you will be able to select the template you created and whatever text or images on your page that you published will show up with the template you wanted.

    Example of basic template files:

    Page 1 (with 1 sidebar):

    header.php
    sidebar.php
    index.php
    footer.php

    Page 2 ( with 2 sidebars):
    header.php
    sidebar.php
    sidebar2.php
    content.php (<— like your index.php page, but it is the new template to include both sidebars)
    footer.php

    (you will have a different index template – I do not name any content pages like index2, rather content.php. and then your two sidebars.)

    Thread Starter voodazzed

    (@voodazzed)

    Ah, okay, i think I’m starting to understand it now. I’ll give a try and see what happens. Thanks again!:)

Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
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