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0:01 Hi, in this specific video you're going to
learn how to use WordPress widgets in the 0:06
side bar. 0:08
Now WordPress widgets are really exciting because you can do a whole lot with widgets.
0:15 So right now we're looking at the live site
and I want to use this as an example. 0:20
And let's say for example, that this side bar, which it is, is widgetized, and what
0:27 that means is you see like recent posts, recent
comments and stuff like that. 0:32
You can actually move this stuff around which is the beauty of widgets.
0:38 And let's say the footer is a widget, which
it is - you can move recent posts down here, 0:44
you can really move stuff around and not only that, you can also add plug-ins, and you can
0:51 add calendars, and things like that.
0:55 Let's say I want to remove all this and just
keep recent posts, and have a calendar. 1:00
I could do that with widgets. 1:04
So now that you have a basic understanding of what widgets are, let me go ahead and go
1:10 to the dashboard and let's start playing around
with some widgets. 1:15
So if you go to the dashboard, widgets are located under the "Appearance" section.
1:21 So go to "Appearance" click on "Widgets" and
as you can see right now these are the available 1:30
widgets. Like existing, available widgets. 1:33
Now you can always add more, but I'm going to keep it simple right now and just keep
1:38 with these widgets.
1:40 Okay so right now, if I go back to the live
site, remember we see on the side bar we've 1:46
got recent posts, recent comments, archives, categories, and Meta.
1:53 So if you go back here, you'll notice the
same thing. 1:58
So the beauty of this is that you can remove certain things, let's say I don't want "Meta"
2:04 - if I don't want "Meta" I can just simply
drag and drop Meta over here. 2:10
Let's say I want to move "Archives" over here, and what happens is it's all real time, so
2:17 if I were to refresh this page, you could
see that everything that you see here: recent 2:27
posts, recent comments, and categories, are here.
2:32 Just as you can see it here.
2:33 Now the search of course is at the top here,
that's the search bar. 2:39
So the main side bar is this here. Then you have your showcase side bar which says "the
2:49 side bar for the optional showcase template".
2:55 And this is the footer area one, you've got
footer area two, and footer area three. 3:03
So what this means is that because you have three that means that there are three different
3:09 columns in terms of the footers.
3:12 So if I put let's say a - say I put "Links"
in footer area one, and I put the calendar, 3:31
say I put the calendar here, and I'll move the calendar it looks like I'll move the links
3:42 up here and the calendar down here, and if
I refresh the page, you're going to see the 3:51
widgets at the very bottom. 3:53
So you can see the calendar here, links - we don't have any links so that's - there's nothing
3:59 that's going to appear there so I might switch
out the links and let's say I'll move "Recent 4:06
Posts" to footer area one. 4:10
So footer area one is going to be on the left hand side, and it's just going to go from
4:14 left to right.
4:16 So if I go back over here, you see "Recent
Posts" in the footer, then the calendar, then 4:24
if I were to add another widget to footer area three, it's going to show up on the right
4:31 hand side.
4:33 So this is really, really fun, and really,
really cool because you can actually move 4:40
stuff around, which makes it really, really convenient.
4:45 Now different themes can be different.
4:47 So for example, we're using the "2011" theme,
and when the theme was programmed, you know, 4:58
this - this area, these are the widgets. 5:02
So for example, some of the premium themes that you buy will have different areas and
5:08 different areas that you can widgetize.
5:11 So for some themes it might give you the ability
to widgitize the top, widgetize the bottom, 5:18
widgetize the middle. 5:19
So you kind of get the point here that widgets basically give you the ability to move things
5:25 around.
5:26 And if I go over here you have, as you can
see, this is a plug-in, so a lot of times 5:33
you'll install a plug-in and you can actually use that as a widget and put it over here.
5:42 So you've got this, you've got Archives, you've
got Calendar, you got Categories, Custom Menus, 5:48
Links, Meta, Recent Comments pages, Recent Posts, RSS Feeds, Tags, Text, and Inserts.
5:58 Texts gives you the ability to add HTML and
this is a little more advanced but if I were 6:06
to drag this, let's say over to the footer. 6:09
"Texts" gives you the ability to add other texts or HTML code.
6:16 So let's say for example, I wanted to add
a picture over here, or like a banner ad, 6:24
or you know, a video, something small that would fit here.
6:28 I could actually do that simply by getting
the HTML code, and just plopping it into here. 6:35
So that's a nifty way of putting up banner ads, and images, and a lot of other stuff
6:43 in the side bar, and you can do that here
and this and that. 6:49
So this is what widgets are all about as you can see, it's really exciting and just play
6:54 around with it and see how you can move things
around and make it work for your site, it's 7:02
that easy.