Front-Page template – why???
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I finally made some sense of this topic but it seems to reveal a big problem with wordpress.com.
There are literally dozens of pages on wordpress.com and hundreds of forum posts telling you how you can change your homepage (eg, from a blog page to a static page) (typically, by going to ‘settings/reading’, and changing things there). But the methods all fail if your theme has a ‘front page’ template, because the front page template (if present) overrides everything and cannot be deleted.
I started randomly switching between themes, and found that many do have ‘front page’, but many do not (they have ‘blog home’, which does the same thing as ‘front page’ BUT – does NOT override efforts to change homepage behavior at settings/reading.
The documentation is clear that ‘front page’ overrides everything else, but my question is – WHY? If you create your own custom home page setup (via settings/reading), and then switch themes to one that uses ‘front page’ rather than ‘blog page’, your site will break. I see so many people experiencing this in the forums here and elsewhere. So – why do some themes include this? Why does wordpress still, in year 2024, have this ‘hard coded’ behavior relating to front page? Why do (some) theme developers still include ‘front page’?
Examples –
- Twenty Twentyfour theme does NOT include Front Page
- Hey (Hey, World) theme DOES include Front Page
- ‘Fewer’ theme does NOT include Front Page
- etc
Twenty TwentyFour is – as I understand it – a showcase for the latest features in worldpress. Hey (Hey, World) is the template I got when I created a new account from scratch (so serves as an introduction to wordpress). I personally spent DAYS trying to understand why I could, and could not (at different times) change my homepage. It’s clearly not obvious to people that this is theme dependent.
Finally – is there ANY way to get rid of ‘front page’, assuming you are using a site hosted at wordpress.com (and thus, don’t have access to the file system).
The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)
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same issue here…. Trying to figure out if there is a way to force the theme to use a normal front/home page.
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I’ve just given up trying to figure it out. I have chosen a theme that does not have a ‘Front Page’ template and I have changed my home page quite successfully.
I also don’t understand why there are two choices on the settings / Reading page, do you? You can change ‘Your homepage displays’ from ‘default’ (which is the Front Page template) to another page, but then there’s a second entry – ‘Default Posts Page’. What does that even mean?
You can only have one ‘default home page’ – the page you get when you type in the domain name without qualification – https://www.xyz.com for example. Under what circumstances would a ‘default posts page’ be served up by wordpress – what user action?
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Yeah, I agree. It is definitely misleading. I don’t know why the two settings…
In any case, I fixed my problem of the main theme not utilizing a proper front page by installing a child theme. A child theme is an extension of the parent theme so it will get all the templates and configuration code, fonts, colors, etc. Most of my settings and templates made through just fine but I spend a days worth of work re-tweaking and adjusting to get it back to the original look.
With the child theme, the default home page that user traffic is directed to when they hit the domain name goes to a proper home page that you can find in the Pages node on the left side bar.
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When in Settings>Reading dashboard of my test site (using the Fewer theme), this is what I see
Note the line at the bottom. Clicking on the “Learn more” link brings me to this Support Guide https://wordpress.com/support/pages/front-page/ where much of this is explained.
Also, noting that here on WordPress.com, the hosting provider, only Creator/Business and Entrepreneur/eCommerce plans can utilize child themes. https://wordpress.com/support/themes/child-themes/
Hope that helps explain.
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The document you referenced (regarding home page) says this: “A home page is the front page of your site. Using the steps in this guide, you can control which page your visitors see first when visiting your website.”. This part is obvious – you are telling WordPress WHAT page to display when NO PAGE is referenced – when the visitor enters your site url with no further qualification (eg, ‘mysite.com’).
What I’m struggling to understand, is what is the point of telling WordPress what the ‘default posts page’ is (second setting on screenshot you provided). The document you referenced simply says “(Optional) Set the default posts page if you choose to use a custom homepage.”. So here, I’m telling WordPress about another page, but what does WordPress ‘DO’ with this information? How does WP make use of this information? There can be only ONE default (displayed when no address given other than base url – mysite.com). What does WordPress do if it has, and if it has not, got this optional information specified?
If I create my own ‘posts page’, (let’s call it ‘MyPostsPage’), a visitor to the site would either have to navigate to ‘mysite.com/MyPostsPage’, of I’d have to provide that navigation to the visitor for them to click on. How is WordPress using this information – under what circumstances would WP choose to take a visitor to the ‘MyPostsPage’ other than when I provide that navigation to them?
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but what does WordPress ‘DO’ with this information? How does WP make use of this information?
Let’s take a step back for a moment.
WordPress started out as blogging software and themes’ homepage was the Posts page and all your published posts were displayed there. Later it was possible to create and set a Static Page as your homepage. If you wanted to additionally include a blog on your website, you needed to create and publish an EMPTY page called Blog, or News, or Updates, etc. and WordPress automatically populated that page with your published blog posts from its database of your published posts (the WordPress Loop), once you indicated which published page was your Posts page in that Reading setting. (BTW, it still works like this for many themes.)
This part of the Support doc I linked to earlier again explains this well:
- Choose from the following options:
- Select the — Default — option to use the homepage design from your site’s theme.
- To use a different page you created, such as a custom design or landing page, select that page from the list. Only published pages (not draft pages) will show here.
- (Optional) Set the default posts page if you choose to use a custom homepage.
- Click the “Save settings” button to save your selected homepage.
What does WordPress do if it has, and if it has not, got this optional information specified?
Let me reverse your order: If you don’t set a default posts page, your posts are published using your theme’s Single Posts Template regardless. How you want to link to those posts is entirely up to you and how you set up your site. If you do set a default blog page, WordPress displays your published posts in the theme’s default Blog Posts Template IN ADDITION to publishing them in the Single Posts Template.
As far as navigation, some themes automatically add all top level pages (Homepage, Posts Page, About, Contact) to your navigation menu, other themes need you to add the pages you want to your site navigation.
The introduction of Block Themes made site creation more interesting as you can now add a Query Loop Block to any page and choose what content should appear there. However, there are still default pages in WordPress, like: Archive, Category, Tag, Author and others.
https://steerpike585.wordpress.com (index)
https://steerpike585.wordpress.com/2024/06/ (archive)
https://steerpike585.wordpress.com/category/uncategorized/ (category)
https://steerpike585.wordpress.com/author/chris3f1316d242/ (author)Now I’m also going to mention that I’ve only had one cup of coffee so far and am working from memory, so if the reality isn’t exactly as I’ve outlined above, that’s on me, but I hope it helps explain a bit more.
If you want to learn more about the nuts and bolts, you might find the WordPress.com Getting Started course helpful
- Choose from the following options:
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Thanks for the detailed response! It has certainly helped a bit. I think most of my confusion is indeed related to the historical evolution of WP from a blogging tool to a general purpose website tool; there’s a lot of ‘default’ behavior coded into it that’s adding to my confusion. I’m more familiar with simple websites where the website serves up “pages” that are specified in the URL request (so ‘mySite.com’ gets the default ‘index.htm’ from the root folder, ‘mySite.com/Hello’ gets a page ‘Hello.htm’ from the root folder, ‘mySite.com/Stuff/Hello’ gets the page ‘Hello.htm’ from subfolder /Stuff, etc)
I asked “What does WordPress do if it has, and if it has not, got this optional information specified?”
You replied “Let me reverse your order: If you don’t set a default posts page, your posts are published using your theme’s Single Posts Template regardless. How you want to link to those posts is entirely up to you and how you set up your site. If you do set a default blog page, WordPress displays your published posts in the theme’s default Blog Posts Template IN ADDITION to publishing them in the Single Posts Template.”
(I wish I knew how to ‘quote’ a paragraph like you did … )
If I don’t set a default posts page, and I type in ‘mySite.com/2024’, I see that WP will give me a list of posts filtered by year = 2024, and if I type in ‘mySite.com/category/Local’, I get a list of posts filtered by category=Local, using what looks like the default ‘Blog Home’ template. So that is, I guess, an example of WP ‘automatically serving me’ something I didn’t specifically ask for. So that’s part of the answer I was looking for.
But here’s a weird thing – I created a page ‘my2ndPostsPage’ and made it a 5×2 grid of posts (using a query block). I set ‘Default Posts Page’ = ‘none’. When I type in the url ‘mySite.com/my2ndPostsPage’, I get a 5×2 gird of posts – exactly as expected. But then I changed ‘Default Posts Page’ = ‘my2ndPostsPage’ – the page that is a 5×2 grid – and now, when I enter the url ‘mySite.com/my2ndPostsPage’ I DON’T get the 5×2 grid, I get a 2x grid that is the ‘Blog Home’ template! Also, when I type in ‘mySite.com/2024’, I still get the 2x grid that is the Blog Home template. So not only do I see nothing ‘using’ ‘my2ndPostsPage’, but even trying to explicitly reference ‘my2ndPostsPage’ fails! So I’m still confused.
Thanks again for your response – it is helpful!
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You’re welcome.
adding a quote block here by typing /quote or by changing the Paragraph symbol in the tool bar above to a Quote symbolBut here’s a weird thing…
You can assign a template to a page. https://wordpress.com/learn/courses/getting-started/templates-explained/ which is part of the self-paced course I mentioned earlier. If you don’t assign a template, including one you’ve created, the fallback or default template will be used.
I think you’ll benefit by working your way through that course as it goes in to much more detail than what I can offer here in the forums.
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Arghhhh … I just spent an hour replying to this post and got ‘error: are you sure you wanted to do that?’ or similar!
So in short – I’ve read through the guide you referred to “https://wordpress.com/learn/courses/getting-started/homepage-and-posts-page/” in detail and it turns out I’m doing EVERYTHING they say!
For the sake of simplicity and to avoid confusion, our recommendation is to work with a Custom Posts Page on any site using a Block theme.
Done that.
To set up a Custom Posts Page:
- create a new regular page
- add the desired page layout or block patterns (ensuring to include dynamic blocks that will display posts)
- use the default Pages template
Done that – created ‘my2ndPostsPage’ with a query block and assigned the ‘Pages’ template.
Under Settings > Reading↗︎ make sure that you do not have any specific published page assigned as the Posts Page. In the default WordPress.com view, this is achieved by leaving the drop down box as – None –.
Totally counter-intuitive, but done that too! If I leave ‘Posts Page’ as ‘None’, my page works fine.
So my only question is, I guess – ‘my2ndPostsPage’ displays my posts in a 5x grid and I like it. But if I type in ‘mySite.com/2024’ or ‘mySite.com/category/Local’, I get my posts displayed in a 2x grid, which is the default layout for the ‘index’ (and other) templates. How do I get these ‘filtered’ posts pages to follow the layout of my custom posts page? Do I need to edit the ‘index’ template to follow the layout of ‘my2ndPostsPage’? That seems inappropriate but I guess I’ll do it if needed.
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How do I get these ‘filtered’ posts pages to follow the layout of my custom posts page? Do I need to edit the ‘index’ template to follow the layout of ‘my2ndPostsPage’?
Customize those templates in Appearance> Editor>Templates.
A template controls the layout of your pages. Not to be confused with Themes (that set the design of your entire site), the template affects the look and feel of an individual page (or post) or groups of pages (or posts.) This guide explains how to work with page templates. About Templates The template controls how the page is displayed. You can identify the template a page is using bThat’s really all I can suggest at this point. You have access to the several guides and resources mentioned in this thread.
If you run into an error or problem while editing your templates, I recommend opening a new query or contacting support directly if you have an upgrade on your site. This thread has gotten very long and we’ve pretty much strayed from the original topic.
Cheers!
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One thing I must say – the guide you referred me to should be required reading for anyone trying to make sense of WordPress. It actually admits, in no uncertain terms, that WP has become very confusing due to its origins as a blogging tool, its transition to a general purpose tool, and perhaps especially due to the introduction of the ‘block editor’.
I thought maybe I just ‘wasn’t understanding the concept’, and your response earlier reinforced that, but – if you actually read the guide, it’s full of stuff like this (these are all quotes from the excellent guide):
But you may be wondering why there is an option to assign a Default Posts Page if we’re recommending that you don’t use it.
WordPress is in a bit of a flux state at the moment in regards to how to handle the Posts page of a site.
… because of iterations that are taking place to refine this setting, it might simply not do what you expect at all.
… Just remember that there are situations when you could end up with your Homepage and your Posts page being identical, or that the Posts page setting will be ignored.
As the Site Editor and themes evolve it is possible that you’ll encounter some unexpected outcomes. Be sure to thoroughly explore your theme, pages, and templates to fully understand what is happening.
Also understand that the options under Settings > Reading↗︎ in the WP Admin (Classic) view are not necessarily intuitive since the release of Block themes.
And also:
For a consistent and straightforward website design experience we recommend using the Default Homepage (the content will be built in a single-use template) and creating a Custom Posts Page
The Front Page template is a bit more opinionated than other templates, in that no matter what other settings you change, the Front Page template will always be your site’s homepage.
For the sake of simplicity and to avoid confusion, our recommendation is to work with a Custom Posts Page on any site using a Block theme.
Taking this approach ensures that your site set up will work as expected for any Block theme, even if you switch themes, and eliminates the need for understanding a range of special use cases and what if scenarios.
Pretty candid stuff!
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