syncbox

Um, couldn’t you use categories for the years instead of Pages?

When a teacher posts, they simply choose which years their post(s) are relevant for… posts may be categorized under multiple categories.

The layout for the page would use category.php assuming you have one or index.php if you don’t.

Let’s say you list all the categories (which results in a list of years, as in

2007
2006
2005
2004 (etc)

clicking that link would get posts from that category only, using the category.php or index.php file (you could create custom category-x.php files for each category id as well)

a URL to the site in question would help. I think that you need to use categories, not Pages. WordPress Pages do not display posts.

HTH

Hmmm… I’d use the c2c get custom field values plugin for this. You’d still do your custom field entries just as you currently are, but in the sidebar, rather than look for the post ID and such, you simply call that key’s entries. You can easily set it up to show in the sidebar ONLY if specific pages or categories, if desired. Let’s assume you are using a custom field named “news” and only want it to show when viewing home and news categories for purposes of this example:

if (is_category('home') || is_category('news')) {
echo '<ul>';
echo c2c_get_custom('news','','','','');
echo '/ul';
}
else {//do not show anything }
?>

I think you could also write it this way:

if (is_category('home') || is_category('news')) {
echo "<ul>".c2c_get_custom('news','','','','')."/ul";
}
else {//do not show anything }
?>

This doesn’t have to be in the loop to work.

You can find the plugin at here and read about how to use it here.

BTW, the empty parameters are explained in the plugin’s examples, but to put it quickly, they are
($field, $before=”, $after=”, $none=”, $between=”, $before_last=’, ‘, $limit=1, $unique=false, $order=’DESC’, $include_static=true, $show_pass_post=false)

* $field : This is the name of the custom field you wish to display

* $before : The text/HTML to display before all field value(s)

* $after : The text/HTML to display after all field value(s)

* $none : The text/HTML to display in place of the field value should no field value exists; if defined as ” and no field value exists, then nothing (including no $before and $after) gets displayed

* $between : The text/HTML to display between multiple occurrences of the custom field; if defined as “, then only the first instance will be used

* $before_last : The text to display between the next-to-last and last items listed when multiple occurrences of the custom field; $between MUST be set to something other than ” for this to take effect

* $limit : The number of recent custom field values you want returned; default is 1

* $unique : Boolean value (either ‘true’ or ‘false’) to indicate if only the latest instance of $field should be considered, and subsequent occurances of $field would be skipped in the search; default is ‘false’

* $order : The order the results should be returned, either ascending/increasing (‘ASC’) or descending/decreasing (‘DESC’); default is ‘DESC’

* $include_static : Boolean (‘true’ or ‘false’) to indicate if static posts (i.e. “pages) should be included when retrieving recent custom values; default is ‘true’

* $show_pass_post : Boolean value (either ‘true’ or ‘false’) to indicate if passworded posts should be considered in the search; default is ‘false’

HTH
syncbox

some tags have echo functionality built-in, such as wp_list_pages() and wp_list_categories(); others don’t. Read this page for more detail:

http://codex.ww.wp.xz.cn/Template_Tags/How_to_Pass_Tag_Parameters

Actually, I’ve modified this… I stripped out the span and class and am taking advantage of the fact that I modified my functions file to stop html filtering (removing) in category descriptions. I put p tags in those, then set up a style for p tags when in a #catlist li

ul#catlist li p {}

works great and simpler, plus the p tags in the li tags check out as valid.

You can duplicate your index.php file and name it category-#.php for each cat that needs a different look, then just modify the html and css accordingly

OR

you can use php conditional statements to write dynamic html/styles in a single index or category file

that’s it, really. You have to use one approach or the other. The simplest is the first option, but it makes keeping pages updated more difficult, imo.

the second method is ideal, but requires real php skills and good xhtml/css skills to make use of WP’s dynamic functionality while addressing future flexibility of your site.

CMS sites are best created using Pages…. but the issue is the same (maybe a bit simpler given the probability of less “post” or non-blog content)… you still have to make separate page templates or use conditional php to write the xhtml tags and classes/IDs you want based on WHICH page is requested.

Most folks are overwhelmed by this if they are new to WP or don’t have the right skills – my first wp site has about 50 category-#.php files used depending upon the content. Most of my recent sites only use the page.php file in conjunction with the header, sidebar and footer files.

You learn as you go!

HTH
Casey

I use the search everything plugin (love it) but I need it to search the blogroll links and/or descriptions. Possible?

I’d make a donation to see this working. Feel free to contact me offlist. syncbox AT gmail DOT com (do the obvious)