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1. jmccall
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   I'm the web designer for a small literary magazine, southeastreview.org. In the past all of our content has been hand-coded but we're about to start offering a lot more and, to expedite the posting of that material, I want to migrate to WordPress. I have a pretty good grasp on how to go about doing this but have a few "is this possible" type questions.

   1) Right now we're a 4 column design. Soon I'll move the navigation menu up top and we'll be a three column design. Column 1 and 2 will be content that changes regularly and 3 will be a list of recent posts/contributors. My question is if there's a way to get WordPress to post different types of content to columns 1 & 2. For instance, column 2 will be podcasts and short interviews that changes fairly often. Column 1 will be larger posts highlighting current content in the print journal. Very much like the current front page except without the navigation column.

   2) I used WordPress a few years ago for a personal blog. And at that point, control of the post "snippets" that showed up on the mainpage was limited to a selection of text in the post itself. I'd like the snippets to be distinctly different from the actual posts (summaries of the posts). Is this possible in the newer versions?

   I'm sure there are other issues I'll have but these are the two that seem most important before attempting the migration. I appreciate your help.

   Josh

2. thelastknight
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   1) You can post as much / different content as you like using multiple loops with individual queries for each loop. So yes it's possible.

   2) In the new version you have the_content() and the_excerpt() with individual input boxes when you create a post!

   Hope this helps. :)

3. jmccall
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   It helps a lot. I'm guessing I can find info about loops in the codex. A clarification though. In the posting interface, how do you designate which loop the content ends up in (e.g. subject tags)? I ask because it's important that, after the migration, non-tech savvy editors can post content easily.

4. thelastknight
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   You can use categories, lets say you create two categories - Podcasts and Journals for example.

   You would then place two loops on the page. One in each of your columns, above each loop you then use query_posts().

   For e.g, the query posts function for a category named Podcasts would be -

   <?php query_posts('category_name=Podcasts'); ?>

   This will then only display posts from that category.

   Then just do the same for the other loop while changing the category name.

5. thelastknight
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   Oh a thing to note if you do use this method. Sometimes this can break the paginate. So you need to write a bit more of an advanced query and inject it into the start of the loop.

   <?php
   
   			$temp = $wp_query;
   
   			$wp_query= null;
   
   			$wp_query = new WP_Query();
   
   			$wp_query->query('category_name=Podcasts&showposts=10'.'&paged='.$paged);
   
   			?>
   
   			<?php while ($wp_query->have_posts()) : $wp_query->the_post(); //start of the loop ?>

   This should then ensure paginate works.

6. jmccall
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   Thanks!

7. jmccall
   Member
   Posted 3 years ago #

   One more question. I'll be installing wordpress on top of the preexisting site (which is mostly .php pages). Is it likely wordpress, in generating its php pages, will overwrite any of the content that already exists? Of course, I'll create a backup and a trial installation first.

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