suggestions

Hello Willem,

I’m sorry but I’ve not understood what is the issue that you explain here:

When I change the text ‘Browse..’ I get the next problem when I select the wrong file: the other files disappear at the right side. I have to use the return function in the browser to see all the files again.

can you clarify what actually happens?

regarding the options, the problem is that I’m not sure I want to make the dropdown as a fully featured alternative, otherwise I will basically have 2 plugins (normal list and dropdown) with their own specific options, and this will lead to have too many options within the widget, and actually several of them won’t be used if you chose the drodown, and viceversa many other won’t be used if you chose the normal list.

anyway because it’s probably very easy that anyone who is not english will need to change the “browse” text, I will add the option to change that, in the next version.

cheers!

Hi Andrea,

When I change the text ‘Browse..’ by editing the plugin in dashboard I get the next problem: The other files disappear When I select I select one of them.

Example: When I activate the css file instead of the template file the other files at the right side of dashboard disappear. I have to use the return function in the browser to see all the files again.

Have you already thought about my suggestion: New feature, I should like to show the total amount of posts in the title of the widget or in the text “Browse..’

Willem

sorry willem but I’m still not sure what are you talking about.. ??

what do you mean with “other files“?
where are you when they disappear? wordpress admin?
when you say “when I activate the css file instead of the template file” what do you mean? do you mean when you duplicate the file pbytax-template.php and copy it into your theme folder, so that you can change the “browse” text?
are you actually editing that file directly into the plugin folder?

as I said previously, I don’t want to add too many options for the dropdown, because the real plugin is about the normal list, and I don’t want to create a whole new bunch of options specific for the dropdown, because the widget options are already a lot, and I fear it will become too confusing.

Sorry Andrea that I’m not clear:

Go to dashboard
Go to installed plugins, go to: WP List Pages by Custom Taxonomy
Click: edit
At the right side you see six “plugin files”
Click: wp-list-pages-by-custom-taxonomy/css/pbytax-admin-style.css

Now you don’t see “wp-list-pages-by-custom-taxonomy/templates/pbytax_template.php” any more.

You have to use the browser to see all the six plugin files again.

Willem

ah ok, please don’t touch those files!

you’re not supposed to edit the plugin files, you have to duplicate the pbytax-template.php file, and place the copy into your theme folder. and then edit that new file, and not the original one.
though you can’t duplicate a file within wp admin panel, you have to use ftp or a file-manager from your server cPanel.

in any case, the files “disappears” because that file is actually into a sub-folder. but the wp editor it display them all together when you first arrive there. then as soon as you click one of them, you enter into its subfolder and wp displays only the files of that subfolder (in that case, there is just the other css file in there).

anyway, the css edits are definitely not supposed to be placed into that file, because pbytax-admin-style.php is a file that is used to style the admin back-end options of the plugin. there is another file called pbytax-style.css which contains the styles for the actual widget in the front-end.

but in any case, you shouldn’t edit that file neither. just place your css rules within the style.css file that you can find editing your own theme, and not the plugin.

I hope it is clearer now. ??

anyway, I’ve decided that instead of making you wait for the next version for the “browse” option, I made a intermediate patch in which that option is already added, so you don’t need to edit the template file. you can download it from here:
patch 1.2.15

cheers!

Hi Andrea,

Thank you for your explanation and the new feature.

I don’t have a child theme yet. I didn’t make it because I use Jetpack stylesheet editor which works as a child theme css editor but not for other files like functions.php.

I didn’t make a child theme until now because I’m not sure about how it works. Maybe you know the answer for me. Suppose I copy function.php and paste it into my child-theme. Then I remove in my child-theme one single code in function.php and replace it with another one. When there is an update of the theme, the functions file won’t be updated because the old function.php is in my child theme and that will overwrite the new function.php. At least, I think so. Am I right?

Willem

Hi Willem.

You don’t necessarily need a child theme, but it is always better because if you edit a file in the child theme, when you update the main theme, the files in the child theme will remain untouched. in the other hand, if you edit the main theme itself, when you update it, your edits will be missed.
so I think it’s the opposite of what you were saying. you make a child theme, and then you activate it. from that point the child is the current theme, but it will pick from the main theme all the files that have not a duplicate into the child theme. so if you place a copy of function.php into the child, from now on, that function.php is the current. so you can modify the function.php in the child theme, and don’t touch the main theme’s. when you update the main theme, the child’s files won’t be touched, so you won’t lose the edits that you have made to the functions.php in the child theme.

anyway, in this case, you don’t have to edit the functions.php file.
you have to add the css rules (I assume the ones to sort the dropdown colour), into the style.css file of your current theme.

if you go to Appearance->Editor, you can edit the style.css file of the current theme. if it’s a child theme, it will be better, but it’s ok anyway, as the themes are not updated very often (surely less often than a plugin).
if you prefer you could use jetpack, it’ll be pretty much the same. just don’t edit the plugin’s css file. ??

that’s for the style. the plugin pbytax.template.php file is a different story. you should connect to the actual files using a program like filezilla and ftp logins, and then make a copy of that file and place it within your theme folder (the child if you have one, otherwise in the main theme).
the plugin is made so that if you have that file in your theme, it will consider that one instead of the one in the plugin folder. in this way, when you update the plugin, you don’t have to put the edits again, because the files in your theme will be untouched.

in any case, if for you it’s too tricky to understand how to connect to the files using ftp logins, then you can edit the pbytax-template.php directly into the plugin folder, but then you have to take notes of your edits because they’ll be lost every time you update the plugin.

actually you can now change the “Browse” word from the widget options, so you don’t need to edit the pbytax-template file anymore.
but you might decide to do it, if you want to add the post numbers like you were asking.
I’ve just figured out that is very easy to do it.
just edit the pbytax-template file (better if you can edit the duplicated version placed in your theme, but if you can’t, just edit the one within the plugin folder), and search for this code:

<option value="#"><?php echo $dropdown_text; ?> </option>

and substitute it with this:

<option value="#"><?php echo $dropdown_text; ?> (<?php echo count($posts); ?>) </option>

this will add next to the “Browse” text, the number of posts into parenthesis.

cheers!

Andrea, thank you very much!

I made a child theme with the changes you suggested in pbytax.template.php Like you can see on my site https://www.razenberg.nl It works!

I Like to make the post number blue and bold. Probably it has to be done in the css file of my stylesheet. Do you know a code for this?

Willem

Great!
I’m glad you’ve been able to do it.

to style only the number, you need first to wrap it into an html span, like this:

<span class="pbytax-posts-num"><?php echo count($posts); ?></span>

then in your child theme css, you can target that class, and set the text colour in this way:

.pbytax-posts-num {
   color:#000099;
}

that’s a normal dark blue, but if you want you can change the code. this site might be helpful (look at the top bar to manually pick a colour and see the code):
https://www.color-hex.com/

good luck with your site!

Hi Andrea,

I can’t change the color yet. These are the codes I used:

<option value=”#”>Kies uit <span class=”pbytax-posts-num”><?php echo count($posts); ?></span> titels</option>

.pbytax-posts-num {
color: #007acc;
font-weight: bold;
}

where have you placed the second part? I mean the css part starting with .pbytax-posts-num
you have to place that part into the style.css file of your theme. is this the case?

whoops!
sorry, my bad! it’s late and I am a bit tired.
you can’t place a span (or any other container) into a selector option tag.

so there is no way to target only a portion of the selector option. I am sorry but it’s not possible to style only the posts number. ??

Hi Andrea,

Thank you for all your support!

Willem