How To: Fixing Popularity Contest Plugin for WordPress 2.5

The problem(s): With some upgrades of the WordPress 2.5 branch, the Popularity Contest WordPress plugin is not working properly. Also, people trying to activate the Popularity Contest plugin on a brand new WordPress install are getting a fatal error or a “doesn’t exist” message when attempting to activate the plugin.

The solution(s): I actually ran into this problem on a fresh install of WordPress. After several attempts, I was unable to figure out the problem myself. Thankfully, a quick Google search showed a post over at WPGuy which gave details on fixing both problems!

Here is what you need to know if you have this problem:

Fix problems with the upgrade to WordPress 2.5

Open your Popularity Contest plugin (edit it) and search for this code:

require('../../wp-blog-header.php');

And replace it with this:

require(’../wp-blog-header.php’);

Fix problems with a new install of WordPress 2.5

In addition to doing the above, you need to search for the following code:

if (isset($_GET['activate']) && $_GET['activate'] == ‘true’) {

And replace it with this:

if (isset($_GET['action']) && $_GET['action'] == ‘activate’) {

I went through both of these steps on my fresh WordPress install and it fixed the problem perfectly!

How To: Making a Categories Drop-Down Menu

Tired of your old navigation? So, what about creating a Magazine-style drop-down menu?
I propose here a drop-down menu listing your pages and sub pages, including one last item to show up your categories directly in the menu.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Read more

How To: Display Adsense On Your First Post Within The Loop

In this guide you’ll learn how to display Adsense on just your first post within the Loop. Sure, there may be plugins that will do this for you. This guide, however, will use code examples to accomplish the same thing by editing your WordPress theme.

The first step is to open up your index.php file in your theme editor. Find the following line:

<?php if(have_posts()) : ?>

Just above that, insert the following like this:

<?php $i = 1; ?>
<?php if(have_posts()) : ?>

Now, scroll down a bit until you find this line:

<?php endwhile; ?>

Insert the following above it, like so:

<?php $i++; ?>
<?php endwhile; ?>

The final step is to insert your Adsense code. Locate where exactly you’d like it within the Loop, and place it between a conditional tag like this:

<?php if ($i == 1) { ?> [YOUR ADSENSE CODE HERE] <?php } ?>

And that’s all you have to do. You can be creative with this code as well. You could add a certain css style class to the top post in your Loop. It doesn’t even have to be the first either, as you can just change the number in $i == 1 to whatever you want. This same method can be used in other archive templates such as archive.php.

How To: Adding the Post Authors Gravatar To Their Individual Posts

One thing I am really excited about is that Gravatars are really starting to gain popularity now that Automattic has purchased and is supporting them.  And now that support is built right into WordPress, it opens up a lot of options for WordPress users.

The most common place you’ll find a Gravatar is usually with an individual comment to help comments stand out.  Another place you will sometimes see them is in the sidebar, like we have it setup here at Hack WordPress.   One thing, however, that people are slowly coming around to is using Gravatars with blog posts to identify the author of the post.    This is something that is a great idea for a multi-author blog and something I’ve considered doing on this website.

So, how would you go about setting up Gravatars to display with each individual post?   Over at ThemeShaper, Ian Stewart recently shared an easy way to do this.   You just need the following code:

<?php echo get_avatar( get_the_author_email(), '64' ); ?>

When used, WordPress will match up the e-mail address associated with the post author to determine what Gravatar to use.   The 64 is the size (pixels) of the Gravatar.

Great find Ian!

How To: Assigning a Name to Your PHP Files

By default, WordPress displays your php files by whatever the file name is. That means if you name your file wordpress.php, that is how it will show in your WordPress editor. When working with page templates, or if you just want to keep your files a little more organized, you’ll probably want to give your templates names.

Here is all you need to do. Paste the following code at the top of the file:

<?php
/*
Template Name: WordPress PHP
*/
?>

Now change WordPress PHP to be the name you want to use. Easy enough, right?  Tomorrow I’ll be posting a little more about page templates!

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