Here we are heading toward Thanksgiving. I can’t believe 2009 is almost over – it seems like it just started.
This week I have a lot of WordPress information, email newsletters, bicycle commuting and some great videos.
Using the WordPress More Tag to Control Content Displayed on Front Page
Most WordPress Themes are set up to display the full post on the front page rather than the excerpt. If you display a number of articles on the front page, such as the 10 that are in the default WordPress settings, this can make for a very long front page.
I like to use the More tag to display the first paragraph or so and then have a link that says Continue or Keep Reading. And what is nice about using the More tag is that you don’t have to edit any templates – it is right on the toolbar in both the html and visual editors.
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Using Thumbnails for Excerpts Plugin with Query Posts to Make a Custom Sidebar Block in WordPress
Last fall I wrote an article about improving your archives with the Thumbnails for Excerpts plugin. This plugin takes the first screenshot in your article and displays it as thumbnail next to your archives listing. The archives must use the excerpt tag, the_excerpt, in order to display the thumbnail. The plugin also has a number of settings that can be adjusted and a class that can be used in the CSS.
Anyway … now that I’ve added that background information I can move on.
WordPress – Enhance Your Archives by Using Optional Excerpts
Earlier this week I discussed the Thumbnails for Excerpts Plugin, which adds thumbnails to the excerpts in all of your archives.
Today I want to discuss an alternative that doesn’t require additional plugins. This is the Excerpts field on your Write > Post page. What? What Excerpts Field? Kim, what are you talking about?
Go to Write > Post and scroll down to the “Advanced Options” section near the bottom. One of the areas is called Excerpts and is just a blank field (that is way too small but that’s another topic). The description says, “Excerpts are optional hand-crafted summaries of your content. You can use them in your template”. Umm … ok. What this means is that whatever you write in this field will replace the default excerpts used by WordPress.
If you use excerpts for your archives, and most templates do, your custom content will appear when you use this field.
