WordPress widgets

I manage. ??

I just can’t do anything with them.

You seem to have more than one problem here. Deactivate all of your plugins again. This time, whilst they are all inactive, see if you can move, add & replace widgets

Ok. Gotcha…….

Ooops! Deactivate or Delete?

I missed this part as you’re posting rather quickly.

I checked my site in this format and my “search” and “recent posts” are not on my site in Twenty Twelve even though they are active according to my dashboard.

Don’t worry about that for now.

Deactivate or Delete?

Deactivating is fine at this point. Deleting may be better but most people don’t want to do that unless they’re forced to.

Sorry. Should I continue to delete those widgets in the main sidebar from my dashboard?

Ok, then let me switch screens back to Php My Admin.

Should I continue to delete those widgets in the main sidebar from my dashboard?

You don’t have to delete all of your widgets. All we need to check is that you can delete (if you wanted to) as well as add new ones or amend existing ones. We want to get back to a point where you have all of the functionality that you should have.

Once we’ve got to that stage, we can start switching plugins on again – one by one checking after each reactivation – to see if we can find which plugins(s) are causing the problems.

On my Php My Admin, active plugins are still set to a:0:{}

Ok, the Widgets I deleted were from my dashboard, but according to PhPMyAdmin they are still there. So does deleting them from my dashboard deactivate them? It seems to be the only thing I can do there.

And you can move widgets into sidebars in Appearance – > Widgets, yes? If so, start the slow reactivation process.

Remember to check that everything is still functioning correctly after each plugin activation. If anything stops working, you’ll have found at least 1 of your problem plugins. Deactivate just that one again and continue with the “one-by-one re-activation & check process” as there could well be more than 1 problematic plugin.

finally, turn turn your original theme back on and check everything is still OK. If anything fails at this point, then the theme is problematic.

I have to log off from here shortly but there are plenty of other regulars around who should be able to help you (if you do hit a problem) and I’ll try to check back again in about 12 hours.

The widgets I deleted are still available to put back into the main sidebar.

Aaawww you mean you have a life outside of the poetry of code? Lol!

Ok, in Twenty Twelve, they are back up and all seems to be fine! Did I accidentally do any of this before you go?

Ok, my sidebar is gone again……sigh