How do I create portfolio Categories

[SteveVanHove]

I want to create categories for the Portfolio page. Any ideas of where to start?

I am using the Balance theme - any solution would have to retain its responsive feature.

My site is under development here.

Thank you!

WP 3.5
Genesis 1.8.2
Balance 1.0

[Bill Murray]

In the Balance theme, the Portfolio page is simply a page template applied to a category, which is Portfolio. In other words, Portfolio is already a category. What appears on that page are the posts in the Portfolio category. If you create sub-categories, you could modify the page template to make sure they display, but it would be a bit of work to have templates for sub-categories.

You may find custom post types more to your liking. If you're a Pro Plus member, you could grab the CPT functionality from another theme, stick it into Balance, and adjust the responsive CSS accordingly.

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[SteveVanHove]

Thanks for your suggestion, Bill. I'll look into using custom post types.

[Chris Cree]

Steve, if you have the Pro Plus package check out the page_portfolio.php file from the Crystal theme. That theme actually shows whatever category you designate using the query_args Custom Field for the portfolio page.

The benefit of that approach is that it's easy to have multiple portfolio pages that show different categories.

The down side is that the layout as far as what is shown is far less flexible.

In your case you might find that easier than going the custom post type approach.

[SteveVanHove]

Thanks for your suggesti0on, Chris. I'm not sure that theme is showing what I am looking for.

I think I may use some kind of galleries plugin - that might be the best thing. Also, this is something my client asked for, so looking into a for-pay customization is not out of the question.

Bottom line is this is what I don't like about WP. My client wanted to redesign his old WP blog, so I felt locked into WP. And, there are so many plugins for WP and it is so irresistible - but if you want to customize something it's another story.

I would much rather work with ExpressionEngine. You get a blank slate from the get-go, so everything you put there is yours. I find the EE workflow very understandable. Not so with WP.

Thanks again for taking the time to help me!

Steve

 

[Bill Murray]

@Steve, There's a learning curve with everything. To me, having struggled with WP over the years, the work needed to do what you want is straightforward. I'd be slower out of the gate with ExpressionEngine. The benefit of Genesis is that it is easy to implement your customizations across a range of child themes, which saves you from starting at ground zero with every project. To customize Genesis themes & WP generally, it does take some understanding of PHP, but with that in hand, you can find the code that is fairly close to what you need in several Genesis child themes. There are also WP repo plugins that allow you to set up and manage custom post types and taxonomies, which means that all you need to do is write a template to display that info the way you want. It may be a challenge the first time, but it will get easier and the templates and techniques you develop can be re-used on a variety of projects.

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[SteveVanHove]

> all you need to do is write a template to display that info the way you want

🙂

Yes, maybe it's time I get an understanding of WP. I was looking around at some guides yesterday and see what others are doing. Do you have a good source for tutorials on customizations?

Thanks again, Chris.

[AnitaC]

Read this by Brian Gardner and just take your time and follow his instructions. He provides very good, easy to read instructions for a variety of things - http://www.briangardner.com/portfolio-page/.

**** NOTE **** be sure to read the comments to. There may be some questions you have that are answered within the comment section.

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Need help with customization or troubleshooting? Reach out to me.

[SteveVanHove]

Thanks, anitac.

Brian Gardner, I believe, actually developed the Balance theme, so what I have on my site is what he has on the Minimum theme discussed in that post.

But I posted a comment on that post - maybe he can steer me in the right direction.

[Bill Murray]

Steve - You'd be better off keeping the discussion here, where more eyes will have a chance to address your issue.

If you have the Balance theme, that's NOT what Brian is discussing in that post. The Balance & Minimum approaches to the Portfolio are totally different. From the earlier discussion in this thread, you want the Minimum approach applied to your Balance theme, which involves stripping out the Balance approach and adding the Minimum approach, or at least changing the terms for the Minimum approach.

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[SteveVanHove]

Hey Bill, sorry, I missed your response until just now.

I'm having a hard time seeing the difference between the Portfolios for Minimum and Balance. And, I know he's not discussing what I want to do, I just wanted to query him there.

Thank you!

[Bill Murray]

The Balance theme uses a regular post type that has a category, and by default all regular post types can have 1 or more categories.

The Minimum theme uses a custom post type. Depending on how you set up the CPT, the CPT can have categories or not.

The differences between a post and a CPT may seem like a minor change in terminology, but it's much more than that. Use of 1 vs the other has a lot of impact.

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