Posts on home page

Make a backkup first, in case this is totally wrong! Then, change this:

foreach ($cats as $cat) {
   $the_query = new WP_Query('showposts=1&posts_per_page=-1&cat='.$cat->cat_ID);

to this:

foreach (array(1) as $cat) {
   $the_query = new WP_Query('posts_per_page=5);

and remove this line:

<p class="category"><span><?php echo $cat->cat_name; ?></span></p>

The syntax error is because I left out a single quote in the WP_Query line. It should be this:

foreach (array(1) as $cat) {
   $the_query = new WP_Query('posts_per_page=5');

As for the category name, try altering this:

<p class="category"><span><?php echo $cat->cat_name; ?></span></p>

to this:

<p class="category"><span><?php the_category(); ?></span></p>

To get the_category() to work, you may need to add the line:

<?php setup_postdata($post): ?>

after your while ( $the_query->have_posts). The moderators have stripped out your code, so I can’t see it any more to be sure. Post just a few lines around the while statement so I can see it again.

After seeing the code, I don’t think you need the setup_postdata.

To change the format of the categories, just add ‘,  ‘ as a parameter as shown below:

$cats = get_categories('exclude='. $GLOBALS[ex_feat] . ',' . $GLOBALS[ex_vid]. ',' . $excluding );
foreach (array(1) as $cat) {
   $the_query = new WP_Query('posts_per_page=5');
   while ($the_query->have_posts()) : $the_query->the_post();
      $do_not_duplicate = $post->ID;?>
      <?php
      $show = true;
      foreach ( $duplicated as $test) { if ( $test == $post->ID) { $show = false; } }
      $count++;
      $duplicated[$count] = $post->ID;
      if ($show) {?>
         <div class="post-alt blog">
            <p class="category"><span><?php the_category(', '); ?></span></p>
            <?php woo_get_image('image',get_option('woo_thumb_width_mid'),get_option('woo_thumb_height_mid'),'thumbnail '.$GLOBALS['align_mid']); ?>

I am shooting in the dark here. Please post the original code in the pastebin so I can see the whole thing.

Thanks for the offer of payment, but I still would not have the theme to work with. I’ll be glad to help once I can see the code.

As far as the 5 recent posts from one category is concerned, are you sure you have more recent posts in a different category? Looks like all those shown on your site are from today.