Learn C++ » WordPress

Tiga and Wordpress 2.5

Alex — Tue, 01 Apr 2008 06:54:23 +0000

Hey everyone,

I just upgraded this site to Wordpress 2.5 and Tiga v2.3 appears to be working just fine.

Thus:

If you are running Tiga v2.3 already should be able to upgrade to Wordpress v2.5 with no major problems.

If you are running an older version of the Tiga theme, install the 2.2/2.3 patch, then upgrade to Wordpress v2.5.

If you are not running Tiga at all, you can download the original Tiga theme here. Then install the 2.2/2.3 patch. Then upgrade to Wordpress v2.5.

If there are any general problems with the Tiga v2.3 theme under Wordpress 2.5, you can leave a response under this thread.

Enjoy!

-Alex

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Alex’s Threaded Comments Wordpress Plugin v0.1

Alex — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 17:21:10 +0000

I’m finally releasing version 0.1 of Alex’s Threaded Comments, a Wordpress plugin that allows you to add threaded comments to your web site. This plugin is really just a fork of the wonderful Brian’s Threaded Comments plugin (v1.5.12). I added a few bug fixes, a few new features, and a new look. Thanks for all the hard work, Brian.

This site is currently running this plugin, so take a look at the comments section below for an idea of how it looks.

Here’s what’s been added/fixed:

Fixed disappearing comment box/reroot issue.
Replaced name/email/URL with login note if logged in.
Changed to use external images so stat counters won’t be inflated.
Added ability to filter out pingbacks (via plugin options).
Added ability to change titlebar color if post was made by an admin (via CSS).
Changed the basic CSS style to look more streamlined.
Mostly fixed/worked-around IE6 rendering problems.

You can download this plugin here. Read the included HowToInstall.txt for directions on how to set the plugin up.

This plugin plays friendly with the WP AJAX Edit Comments plugin.

Because I didn’t write the original code for this plugin, I’m not intending to provide tech support for it. However, if you’re having a problem, you can post a message in my Wordpress forum and maybe some kind soul will answer it. If you have any suggestions for future features or bug fixes you’d like to see, you can post those here.

Enjoy.

Wordpress Tiga theme 2.2 / 2.3 upgrade

Alex — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 20:20:22 +0000

I have updated the Tiga theme (which this site uses) to be compatible with both Wordpress 2.2 and 2.3.

This update:
* Fixes the widget problems that were introduced under Wordpress 2.2 (thanks, Otto42 for a solution that was cleaner than mine).
* Fixes the blogroll issues that were introduced under Wordpress 2.3.

I have also given the theme a new version number: 2.3.

To install this patch, simply unzip the files into your tiga-06 theme directory. Note: Older version of CPanel will not overwrite files that already exist when unzipping files. In this case, unzip them to a local directory and FTP them into your tiga-06 theme directory, or this script may work for some people.

You can download the update here.

Note: This patch appears to work for Wordpress v2.5 as well.

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Wordpress Plugin: Category/Archive Indexing

Alex — Sat, 30 Jun 2007 18:16:58 +0000

By default, WordPress displays categories and archive listings in blog form — that is, by showing either excerpts or the entirety of the last N posts (dependent upon theme). While this is great for reading, it’s less than wonderful when searching for specific past entries.

Category/Archive Indexing is a WordPress plugin that helps replace the blog style category and archives listings with a list of links to each individual post. It will also work with Simple Tagging Plugin tags.

(Actual look may vary depending on theme)

For a better idea of what this plugin can do, here are some sample pages from this site: a category index, a tag from the tag cloud, and a link from the monthly archive.

To install the plugin:

1) Download the plugin.
2) Upload the plugin to your wp-content/plugins directory.
3) Activate the plugin.

The plugin provides three functions:

function CAI_Header($headerStyleStart='
', $headerStyleEnd='

')

CAI_Header() displays a heading on the page between the $headerStyleStart and $headerStyleEnd elements. In the above picture, it is responsible for the “Category: Wordpress” header.

function CAI_SetNumberOfPosts($limit)

CAI_SetNumberOfPosts() determines how many links to show. If you want to show all the links in a category/archive, set it to an arbitrarily large number, such as 99999. If you do not call this function, the default will be however many posts you have set to display on your front page.

function CAI_DisplayLink($beforeLink='', $afterLink='')

CAI_DisplayLink does the actual displaying of the link itself, and goes inside the_loop. It contains two parameters that you can use to provide customized style elements. $beforeLink can be set to

if you would like to display your links as part of an ordered or unordered list.

Unfortunately, the plugin is not plugin-and-play. To use the plugin, you will need to modify (or create) an archive.php and/or category.php in your theme directory. You can use the following template for both, which will work with many themes:

The div HTML element needs to be altered to match your theme. It tells the browser how to format the list of links. The best way to figure out what to use is to look inside your index.php. The first div you run across is likely to be the one you want. Simply replace the div in the above template with the first div from your index.php and you will probably be good to go.

For example, the first div found in the wp-andreas01-12 theme index.php is

. For that theme,

should be replaced with

You can also change the CAI function parameters to reflect your tastes.

Tiga fans, the following zip file contains an archive.php and category.php. Extract them to your wp-content/themes/tiga-06 directory.

Author’s note: I am not a PHP coder, nor a Wordpress expert. This plugin was cobbled together after examining other people’s code and a lot of trial and error. If you have any comments about things I could do better/differently, I’d love to hear it.

Recent news box for Tiga 1.0.2 theme (updated)

Alex — Sat, 02 Jun 2007 21:41:13 +0000

A few days ago, I added a “recent news” box to the front page of the site, which shows the most recent items posted in the News category. It’s the easiest way to find the most up to date news about the site or the C++ Tutorial.

Today when I was investigating how to make the box wider, I realized that I’d used the wrong CSS style in the newspage.php file, and consequently, the margins on the news box were being set equivalent to the width of the sidebars! Obviously that is not what I had intended!

The original style.php file did not have an appropriate style to use for this kind of addition, so I had to define my own. I also had to update the newspage.php file to use the new style. Then I figured, as long as I’m updating the style.php, I might as well make the margin parameter user-definable, so I modified the functions.php and added a parameter to the Tigarator. Consequently, the procedure below now has one more step, where you set the margin of the box through the Tigarator.

For you Tiga fans who would like to add your own recent news box to your Tiga-themed web site, here’s how you do it.

1) First, install the customizable post listings plugin. This plugin is what does the work of listing the posts.

2) Second, download the newspage page template and associated files, and extract them to a local directory. This newspage page template will only work with the Tiga theme. NOTE: If you’ve already hand-modified functions.php or style.php, this will overwrite your changes!

3) Third, edit the newspage.php file with an editor (for Windows users, wordpad works fine). You will see a line that looks like this:

%post_date%: %post_URL%
", "4"); ?>

Change the “4″ to the category ID of the category you want the box to display posts from. If you want the box to display posts from multiple categories, change the “4″ to a space separated list of category IDs.

4) Upload the template into your wp-content/themes/tiga-06/ directory.

5) Go to your WordPress Administrator. For each page you wish to have a recent posts box: Edit the page. On the right side, you should see a “Page Template” box. Select “Newspage”. Save your page.

6) Go into the Tigarator (Presentation -> Tigarator). You will see a new option named “Inner Widget Margin”. This is the margin for the news box. Set an appropriate value, such as 50.

That’s it.

Hyperlinking your WordPress CSS header image

Alex — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 05:24:32 +0000

One question that I’ve been struggling with over the last week is how to make the Wordpress header image hyperlink back to the site itself. Many WordPress themes use the CSS background-image properly to display the header image. Unfortunately, there’s no direct way to modify the CSS style sheet to turn the image into a link.

However, there is a way to edit the header.php to do it.

Many themes will have a link that looks like this:

Recent news box on front page for Tiga 1.0.2 theme (obsoleted)

Alex — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 04:07:38 +0000

Note: This blog article has been superseded by the article at http://www.learncpp.com/?p=30.

I added a “recent news” box to the front page of the site, which shows the most recent items posted in the News category. It’s the easiest way to find the most up to date news about the site or the C++ Tutorial.

For you Tiga fans who would like to add your own recent posts box to your Tiga-themed web site, here’s how you do it.

1) First, install the customizable post listings plugin. This plugin is what does the work of listing the posts.

2) Second, download the newspage page template and extract it to a local directory. This newspage page template will only work with the Tiga theme.

3) Third, edit the newspage.php file with an editor (for Windows users, wordpad works fine). You will see a line that looks like this:

%post_date%: %post_URL%
", "4"); ?>

4) Upload the template into your wp-content/themes/tiga-06/ directory.

That’s it.

Tiga 1.0.2 widget fix for WordPress 2.2

Alex — Wed, 30 May 2007 18:10:44 +0000

This website utilizes the wonderful Tiga 1.0.2 theme, which works great under WordPress 2.1.3. However, when I upgraded the site to WordPress 2.2 (which now has built-in widget functionality), it quickly became clear that the widget functionality was not working properly under the Tiga 1.0.2 theme. Although you can set up your widgets, Tiga 1.0.2 doesn’t realize you’ve changed from the default, and always uses the default set of widgets instead.

After mucking through a bunch of css and php code, I was able to fix the issue. Since Tiga is one of the more popular themes out there, I’m making this solution publicly available.

Download the Tiga 1.0.2 widget fix for Wordpress 2.2 *(see note at bottom of post).

Installation is easy. Just copy the sidebar.php file over the existing one in your tiga-06 theme folder.

Happy blogging.

Edit: General Wordpress/Tiga questions not specifically related to this fix are best posted in the forum, where I am more likely to see them. I am happy to try and answer any questions you may have.

* Important note: I just released a patch for the Tiga theme under Wordpress 2.3. It should be backwards compatible with 2.2 as well.

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