Can you be more detailed about what you mean with: “It should just change to the correct sidebar whenever the category calls it. I also tried tying it to the post name, but no luck there either.”
Also, what are the exact settings you use for your sidebar?
Thread Starter
MargoA
(@margoa)
Thank you for your prompt response.
My blog home page has 3 columns. The left column is composed of 4 widgets, with one widget that changes book covers depending on the content. Each blog post has a category. When I set up the sidebar, I used a category to trigger the change of widgets.
Here are 2 screen shots of the sidebar (plus 1 shot of the complete screen) and 1 screen shot of the blog sidebar that changes. I also included a screen shot of the blog post showing the Categories checked. The category is “Working on the Road.”
http://sidebar.movingonwithmargo.com
The problem is that the sidebar widget does not change. I have to change it manually each week when I change the blog post (if the category is different from the previous post).
Hope this helps,
~Margo
Blog: MovingOnWithMargo.com
Thank you for your information.
Am I correct that for your use case, you want the sidebar on the front page to change depending on the latest post shown?
When selecting a category in the sidebar editor, you tell the sidebar that it should be displayed with all posts containing that category.
Can you confirm this behaviour on your site?
Thread Starter
MargoA
(@margoa)
You are correct. I do NOT see this behavior on my site.
So the problem with that is that Content Aware Sidebars (and your WordPress installation) by default does not know that it should only look at the most recent post when determining the type of content.
I.e. right now, Content Aware Sidebars treats the front page as such, because it cannot know that in this specific case, you only want to display a sidebar based on the most recent post.
Because the plugin is very modular, this functionality can be integrated quite easily.
When I am looking at http://movingonwithmargo.com/behind-scenes-rv-cooking-show-2/, it looks like that the same widget is displayed several times with similar content. Is this caused by the category conditions in Content Aware Sidebras?
Thread Starter
MargoA
(@margoa)
Yes, this caused by the category conditions in Content Aware Sidebars.
Alright. As I said before, your specific use case for the front page is unfortunately not directly supported by the plugin, but it could be implemented by modifying/creating a module.
Thread Starter
MargoA
(@margoa)
Sorry, Joachim, I think we are going astray here. You were looking at an archived post, and the sidebars go crazy (probably the theme). http://movingonwithmargo.com/behind-scenes-rv-cooking-show-2/
If you could look at a current post, http://movingonwithmargo.com. (It changes every Friday.)
So…you are saying that since several posts display on the same page, the sidebar does not know to call up the category of the top post on the page.
If there is a workaround, please let me know.
Thank you for your patience.
P.S. Just in case this is important…In another theme use (Easel), where only one post displays on the page, the problem was the same.
Yes, the reason is that Content Aware Sidebars does not “know” your specific use case, that you only want to focus on the most recent post. But showing 1 or 1000 posts on the front page would not make a difference, simply because Content Aware Sidebars will treat the front page as a front page.
Now, it is not at all impossible to solve your problem, and I see two options:
1. Create/modify a module in the plugin so that your use case is supported
2. Modify the widget so that it supports your use case (i.e. you can insert it in any sidebar)
Thread Starter
MargoA
(@margoa)
So…you are saying that if I move the content to the “blog” page, the sidebar would work correctly?
To create/modify a module (for the front page) would require a special project from you ($$)?
Because the “blog” page is treated as a post archive, I do not think it would work out of the box there either.
If you can get your front page to only show 1 post (the latest), I will gladly help you from there.
To do that you can insert the following code in front-page.php/index.php or home.php (depending on your theme):
global $query_string;
query_posts( $query_string . '&posts_per_page=1&nopaging=true' );
