Title: Header Code to Make Admin Preview Work Last modified: June 30, 2020 --- # Header Code to Make Admin Preview Work * Resolved [markroth](https://wordpress.org/support/users/markroth/) * (@markroth) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/) * I have created a php-free template to generate my original hand-coded static- html home page. * A problem I have is post/page prepublication admin previews show the home page, the the post/page to be previewed. * In other words, everything after the question mark in the URL is ignored. * My assumption is that I need to add some wp-related code to my home page so post/ page admin previews work properly. * I have done a lot of searching…unsuccessfully. * Which line(s) of code from the header do I need to include to get this pre-pub admin preview working? * Thanks, Mark - This topic was modified 5 years, 9 months ago by [Jan Dembowski](https://wordpress.org/support/users/jdembowski/). Reason: Moved to Fixing WordPress, this is not an Developing with WordPress topic * The page I need help with: _[[log in](https://login.wordpress.org/?redirect_to=https%3A%2F%2Fwordpress.org%2Fsupport%2Ftopic%2Fheader-code-to-make-admin-preview-work%2F%3Foutput_format%3Dmd&locale=en_US) to see the link]_ Viewing 7 replies - 1 through 7 (of 7 total) * [Joy](https://wordpress.org/support/users/joyously/) * (@joyously) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13054973) * I can’t tell what you are referring to. There is a preview in the editor and there is a preview in the Customizer. Which one are we talking about? Also, when you say “php-free template”, do you mean a template file in your theme or a reusable block or a HTML file in your home directory? * Thread Starter [markroth](https://wordpress.org/support/users/markroth/) * (@markroth) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13055041) * Thank you for your reply, Joy. * I’m sorry about my lack of specificity in those regards. * I’m talking about the preview in the editor and a template for my child theme. * This single-use template is for the home page. It does not use WP header, footer, content, sidebar, or any such. (This is a stop-gap measure until I have the time to develop something different that’s entirely WP.) * Well, an unanticipated result of going this route is that when I want to preview an unpublished post or page, it displays the home page. * I assume that’s because the header is missing whatever WP code it takes to display the unpublished post/page instead. So I would like to add that code to my template without getting any of the other header code. * [Joy](https://wordpress.org/support/users/joyously/) * (@joyously) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13055432) * OK, I tried to reproduce what you are seeing and failed. Perhaps my test is not what you have? I don’t have any plugins that do redirection, I have a normal. htaccess file, the theme doesn’t do anything weird. I made a child theme that does nothing but hold a template named my-static.php. It contains the bare minimum for making a page. It has to have one php tag in order to have the template comment marker or I wouldn’t be able to select it in the editor. * ```

This is my page. Ain't it great?

``` * I set my home page to an existing Page and in the editor, assigned the new page template. Clicking on Update to save the template choice, I can then click on Preview and see the content of my-static template as expected. I go to the Page list and Post list and any existing pages/posts show correctly in the editor and the preview. I click on Add New Page and type something. Click on Preview and it shows what I typed. Same for Posts. I just don’t see what you are saying happens. This was tested with WP 5.2.7 and WP 5.4.2, both editors. * So, what about my setup is different from yours besides the HTML of the static template? * Thread Starter [markroth](https://wordpress.org/support/users/markroth/) * (@markroth) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13055789) * Wow, Joy! You have gone to a lot of bother to be helpful. I’m incredulously appreciative of that. * Alas, I’m here to eat humble pie. I’m chagrined, dismayed, mortified, and so forth. * All that time and effort you invested was not necessary…because of an oversight of mine. I am very, very sorry. 🙁 * All the hours I spent trying this and trying that, and all the hours I spent looking there and looking here, were not necessary…because of an oversight of mine. * I forgot to delete the original index.html from the root directory! After reading your previous message and seeing that what you did was essentially what I did… it suddenly hit me that I’d forgotten index.html. I renamed it…and preview works. * Valuable lesson for me to learn. I’m sorry it cost you too. 🙁 * Grateful for your time and help, Mark * [Joy](https://wordpress.org/support/users/joyously/) * (@joyously) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13056247) * That’s actually funny, because my first answer I was typing was an explanation of how the index.html and index.php files can be designated in a different order, and which did you do, etc. I reread your question and decided you weren’t doing that, so I changed my answer. But testing your scenario made me see some strange error with a child theme of mine, which I am still investigating, so thanks! * Thread Starter [markroth](https://wordpress.org/support/users/markroth/) * (@markroth) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13061536) * Thank you, Joy, for your gracious reply. 🙂 * Thread Starter [markroth](https://wordpress.org/support/users/markroth/) * (@markroth) * [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13070647) * Just in case anyone ever sees this thread and thinks it might address a problem they’re having, I just did a blog post explaining what I did: [Create a Custom WordPress Page Template for HTML Content](http://www.eaf.net/mvp/2020/create-a-custom-wordpress-page-template-for-html-content/). 🙂 Viewing 7 replies - 1 through 7 (of 7 total) The topic ‘Header Code to Make Admin Preview Work’ is closed to new replies. ## Tags * [header](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/header/) * [static html](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/static-html/) * In: [Fixing WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting/) * 7 replies * 2 participants * Last reply from: [markroth](https://wordpress.org/support/users/markroth/) * Last activity: [5 years, 9 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/header-code-to-make-admin-preview-work/#post-13070647) * Status: resolved ## Topics ### Topics with no replies ### Non-support topics ### Resolved topics ### Unresolved topics ### All topics