Modern portfolio about box not working right?

[hannahransom]

Hi,

I have modern portfolio theme and currently have a static home page and blog as a separate page. I'd like to change this and have an intro in the "about" box that comes with modern portfolio with recent articles under that.

Whenever I put widget into the about box right now what it does is goes to the blog page that I have and shows NO recent posts under it. What's up with that?

I know this theme is kind of different with the links being able to just go down the page, but I don't want that, so I'm hoping that isn't the solution. Any help?

Also, is there a way to make the widgets in the box populate horizontally? For instance, if I did an image (like picture), a little about, and then a sign up form, would it be possible to have them side by side instead of on top of each other?

http://holistichormonalhealth.com

[nutsandbolts]

You can use Genesis column classes: http://my.studiopress.com/tutorials/content-column-classes/

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

Thanks! Do you know anything about why the about section is coming up on my (standalone) recent posts page and making all of the recent posts disappear?

[nutsandbolts]

The Articles page? I'm seeing a list of posts.

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

Whoa, that was so fast! Yes, that is because I do not have the widget enabled right now. I wanted to enable the widget so that I could put my site byline and everything in there but when I enable it it goes to the articles page (rather than home) and takes away all of the posts (so the widget is all you see).

I'm wondering if it is because of having a static front page but afraid to try it because I don't suddenly want to have a black box with nothing else on my home page.

[nutsandbolts]

Your theme's home.php is set to replace the Genesis loop with widget areas if any of the home widget areas are active. Checking to see what you'd need to do to get both the widgets and the loop to show...

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[nutsandbolts]

Probably the easiest way to display posts on the homepage would be to use the About widget (with your Settings > Reading set to show latest posts), then to drop the Genesis Featured Posts widget into one of the other home widget areas and configure it to show a list of posts. If you need more control over what to display, you can install the Genesis Featured Widget Amplified plugin.

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

That's why it's weird. I do want to change the recent posts to home, but it's weird that the widget is going to recent posts. And it makes me nervous that it is going there and blanking everything else out!

[hannahransom]

Ok, thanks, I'll have to play with it a little. I'm not sure if what you are saying is just giving a list of recent posts in sidebar or if they are all below the header/nav/about widget (when I put it in there).

It's so weird, this tripped me up when I changed themes, too, a lot of the widgets were populated and I couldn't get to my articles and was freaking out!

Thanks for your help, I'll be back here if I am still having issues.

[nutsandbolts]

No problem. I'm still not exactly sure what it's doing versus what you want it to do, so if you put it back in place and need help, leave it there for a few minutes and post back so I can take a look at it.

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

Here I'll do it so you can check it out and just write "Sorry, be back in a second"... Done, you can check it now.

[nutsandbolts]

Okay, you can change it back. 🙂

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[nutsandbolts]

Okay, let me make sure I'm understanding correctly. On the Articles page, you want to show the About widget area at the top, then show posts like normal. Is that correct? Do you want the sidebar to show?

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

I am planning on putting the articles on the home page w/ home type info (who I am, pic, opt in, what this site is) in the about box and then doing recent articles under that. I have just had the two (home and article) separate for a while, but I'm sick of it and thought the about box would be a good way to have that home info.

So basically no standalone recent posts page, but home is
Header/nav
About box with stuff in it
Recent posts

I also do not want to use the hashtag nav that makes it scroll to different sections. I hate that for some reason.

Just FYI, I have an interview in about 10 min so if you don't here from me for an hour after that and have a question that is why 🙂

[nutsandbolts]

Good luck on your interview! I'm working on a fix right now. Hopefully I'll have it for you by the time you get back.

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[nutsandbolts]

Try this and see how it works for you. Once you've done this, you should be able to change back to showing posts on the homepage instead of the static page, and you should be able to use the About widget area (and any of the other homepage widget areas) while still showing posts below them.

First, find the following in your stylesheet:

.mp-home #inner {
padding: 0;
max-width: 100%;
}

and change it to this:

.mp-home #inner {
padding-top: 40px;
max-width: 1080px;
}

Then remove all the contents of your home.php and replace with this:

<?php
/**
 * Controls the homepage output.
 */

add_action( 'genesis_meta', 'mp_home_genesis_meta' );
/**
 * Add widget support for homepage. If no widgets active, display the default loop.
 *
 */
function mp_home_genesis_meta() {

	if ( is_active_sidebar( 'about' ) || is_active_sidebar( 'portfolio' ) || is_active_sidebar( 'services' ) || is_active_sidebar( 'blog' ) ) {

		// Add mp-home body class
		add_filter( 'body_class', 'mp_body_class' );
		function mp_body_class( $classes ) {
			$classes[] = 'mp-home';
			return $classes;
		}

		// Add homepage widgets
		add_action( 'genesis_after_header', 'mp_homepage_widgets' );
	}
}

function mp_homepage_widgets() {

	genesis_widget_area( 'about', array(
		'before' => '<div id="about"><div class="wrap">',
		'after' => '</div></div>',
	) );

	genesis_widget_area( 'portfolio', array(
		'before' => '<div id="portfolio"><div class="wrap">',
		'after' => '</div></div>',
	) );

	genesis_widget_area( 'services', array(
		'before' => '<div id="services"><div class="wrap">',
		'after' => '</div></div>',
	) );

	genesis_widget_area( 'blog', array(
		'before' => '<div id="blog"><div class="wrap">',
		'after' => '</div></div>',
	) );
}

genesis();

Let me know how it goes!

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

Oh, geez, crazy. I thought this was going to be something simple.

Weird that it looks like that on the theme preview but it's hard to do. Is that just because I don't want the jump navigation?

Ok, I still have not figured out how I want to do child stuff since getting genesis, so I am going to do this AFTER I figure that out, I guess. I have left everything default so far, but need to change the fonts and link colors at least, anyway, I've just been preoccupied with work that doesn't have to do with my website. Hopefully for the rest of this week I will have a little more time and can play around with web stuff.

Thanks again!

[hannahransom]

Ok, so I am finally playing around with this stuff. I was in my FTP looking at the style sheets today (looking for where to change the hyperlink color which seems to be decidedly absent!) and I know for that I can add onto the bottom after a note to myself so that if I ever have to update it I can copy and paste back in my changes.

Is it safe to just change out the home.php? What if there is a child theme update for my theme and I lose everything? I'm still so new to genesis and don't really understand the ins and outs of making changes.

[nutsandbolts]

Yes, you can make any changes you want. Luckily, though, child themes don't update - sometimes StudioPress revamps them (like with the Pro themes that are being released now) but they are considered a whole different theme. You'll never be prompted to update the child theme in your WP dashboard; only the framework. So any changes you make to the files in your theme's folder are safe.

---

Andrea Whitmer, Owner/Developer, Nuts and Bolts Media
I provide development and training services for designers • Find me on Twitter and Google+

[hannahransom]

Great! So, I did it, and now I do have the nice about part over my recent articles, but for some reason when I set recent articles as the home page it won't work. Maybe it has something to do with my current menu and navigation. I am going to be playing around with it!

I will be excited when I get it because the article page is JUST what I want for my home page (other than a few css things that I need to figure out).

[Author]

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