Hi Josh
OK. from my point of view, you can use two method to get a category description.
The first one uses external files named with the category slugs that you store in your theme directory.
The second one uses some posts you write via the WorpPress dashboard.
WITH EXTERNAL FILE :
The main idea is to include in the top of your category template a file named with the category slug.
Let's say, for instance, that you have two categories : cat and dog.
1- create a directory in your theme folder and name it : /cat_description.
2- In this directory, create a file for each category :
cat.php
dog.php
3- Edit this file and put any content you like for the description. This content can include some CSS (that you will define in your style.css), line breaks, paragraphs, links, etc.
4- In the category template of your theme, i.e. "category.php", Put this code wherever you want the description to appear :
<?php
$category = get_the_category('');
$cat_slug = $category[0]->cat_name;
if (file_exists(TEMPLATEPATH. '/cat_description/'.$cat_slug.'.php') ) {
include (TEMPLATEPATH . '/cat_description/'.$cat_slug.'.php');
} else {
echo '';
}
?>
This code get the category slug as a variable, it looks in the "cat_description" directory if a file of this name exist. If so, it display the content of this file. If there is no file of such a name, it display nothing.
--------------------
WITH POSTS YOU WRITE VIA WORDPRESS :
1 - Create a category named "category description"
2 - Write some posts to describe categories, and use the exact category name you describe for title. Of course, you choose "category descripton" as category for these posts.
3 - In the category template of your theme, i.e. "category.php", Put this code wherever you want the description to appear :
<?php
$category = get_the_category('');
$cat_slug = $category[0]->category_nicename;
query_posts(array(
'name'=> $cat_slug,
) );
if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post();
echo '<div class="category_description">';
the_content();
echo '</div>';
endwhile;
endif;
wp_reset_query();
?>
As you can see, I wrote a "div" in this code. You can define this div in your "style.css".
This code get the category slug you are in, it looks if there is a post with the same name, if so, the content of the post is displayed, if no, nothing is displayed...
--------
Each method have his pro and cons.
With the external file, you have to write the content yourself in an external text editor and upload files manually. You can use an html editor to get the code you like, or even wordpress (you write a post and copy/paste the html, without saving the post)
With the posts via wordpress method, you have the advantage of the full WYSIWYG editor and you do not need to manually upload files, but you will have to edit your template files to hide the posts from category "category description" in your index, your archives, your category list, etc.
From my point of view, the external files are more simple. And as you can use wordpress as an html editor, from wich you can cut and paste the result in the external file, you also have the benefit of the WYSIWYG editor.
Voilà... :-)
S.
joshklein
Luigino
evilnrj
Pierre_02