Alright! I got it worked out. Not quite the way I wanted — but by god, it works. So, if anyone’s interested:
Looks like /admin/settings.php controls most of the ‘Mantra Settings’ panel. Open it up and ctrl+f for ‘frontcolumns’ .. if say, I want 9 total columns; change this line
$items = array ("0" ,"1", "2" , "3" , "4");
to:
$items = array ("0" ,"1", "2" , "3" , "4", "5" , "6" , "7" , "8", "9");
And duplicate this block of code for each column being added (and change every ‘4’ to a ‘5’, etc.):
<div class="slidebox">
<h4 class="slidetitle" > <?php _e("4th Column","mantra");?> </h4>
(...)
</div>
Not too bad so far. Save, then open /includes/theme-frontpage.php and ctrl+f for ‘column3’ .. this was the tricky part for me.. grab this block of code (which is for column 3):
<?php if($mantra_nrcolumns != '2') { ?>
<div id="column3">
<a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink3) ?>"> <div class="column-image" ><img src="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnimg3) ?>" id="columnImage3" alt="" /> </div> <h3><?php echo $mantra_columntitle3 ?></h3> </a><div class="column-text"><?php echo do_shortcode ( $mantra_columntext3 );?></div>
<?php if($mantra_columnreadmore) {?> <div class="columnmore"> <a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink3) ?>"><?php echo esc_attr($mantra_columnreadmore) ?> »</a> </div><?php } ?>
</div>
Copy and paste it after the block of code for column 4, for each additional column. Then change out the numbers beginning with the fourth column (which reads nrcolumns == '4' in the first line) so that the first line now shows the previous column number:
<?php if($mantra_nrcolumns != '3') { ?>
and the rest of the block reflects the current column number. Then the last column is changed so that all numbers in this block reflect the last column number, and also change the != in the first line to == . So, the resulting snippet is:
<?php if($mantra_nrcolumns != '2') { ?>
<div id="column3">
<a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink3) ?>"> <div class="column-image" ><img src="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnimg3) ?>" id="columnImage3" alt="" /> </div> <h3><?php echo $mantra_columntitle3 ?></h3> </a><div class="column-text"><?php echo do_shortcode ( $mantra_columntext3 );?></div>
<?php if($mantra_columnreadmore) {?> <div class="columnmore"> <a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink3) ?>"><?php echo esc_attr($mantra_columnreadmore) ?> »</a> </div><?php } ?>
</div>
(...)
<?php if($mantra_nrcolumns != '7') { ?>
<div id="column8">
<a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink8) ?>"> <div class="column-image" ><img src="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnimg8) ?>" id="columnImage8" alt="" /> </div> <h3><?php echo $mantra_columntitle8 ?></h3> </a><div class="column-text"><?php echo do_shortcode ( $mantra_columntext8 ); ?></div>
<?php if($mantra_columnreadmore) {?> <div class="columnmore"> <a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink8) ?>"><?php echo esc_attr($mantra_columnreadmore) ?> »</a> </div><?php } ?>
</div>
<?php if($mantra_nrcolumns == '9') { ?>
<div id="column9">
<a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink9) ?>"> <div class="column-image" ><img src="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnimg9) ?>" id="columnImage9" alt="" /> </div> <h3><?php echo $mantra_columntitle9 ?></h3> </a><div class="column-text"><?php echo do_shortcode ( $mantra_columntext9 ); ?></div>
<?php if($mantra_columnreadmore) {?> <div class="columnmore"> <a href="<?php echo esc_url($mantra_columnlink9) ?>"><?php echo esc_attr($mantra_columnreadmore) ?> »</a> </div><?php } ?>
</div>
..and finally just below the last column there’s this confusing line:
<?php } } }?>
..if say, I now have a total of 9 columns, this line should be changed to have 8 closing curly braces:
<?php } } } } } } } }?>
Whew. Didn’t have any issues with layout or css surprisingly .. backend and frontend look pretty good so far. Id love to do this through my child theme somehow, but this works for now.
