Issues with adding links to sidebar
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First off a word of thanks. You’ve made this blogging thing fairly painless and have no doubt saved countless ears by giving me a place to sound off.
Please keep in mind I’m still fairly new to blogging so there are things I don’t understand. I want to add links to my sidebar but I want to break them up into separate categories and also want to include a short description if possible. I read “How can I post buttons and images links in my sidebar?” but I don’t understand what “Del.icio.us” is all about so I have no idea if I’d need/want it. Nor do I understand what/why I’d want a “widget”. Is a widget just a picture?? Can you help me?? Oh, and once I set these up will I be able to edit/add/delete links after that?? What I’d like to end up with is…..
News Sources
ABC
url….NBC
url…..Research/Reference
Dictionary
url…..Politics
DNC
url…..RNC
url….(My blog is http://flosuniverse.wordpress.com)
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The easiest way to achieve this is to add your desired links from Write -> Link in your dashboard. Place your links in different link categories (News Sources, Research/Reference, etc…). Then, you can simply add the Links Widget from Design -> Widgets.
You can easily manage all of your links and link categories from Manage -> Links and Manage -> Link Categories.
For a description of the Widget and its formal definition, please see –
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Note that you already have some widgets in your sidebar, and your “Blogroll” is a link widget.
But If you want links with images or links plus comments, you need to add Text widgets. As with Links widgets, you can name each Text widget as you please.
Of course you can subsequently edit, add or delete links – in both Links and Text widgets. The difference is that for a Link widget you go to Write>Link or Manage>Links, as bubel says above, while for a Text widget you go to Design>Widgets and edit its content there. Another difference is that in a Text widget you must order the links yourself (and you’ll need some html for good results), while the links in a Link widget are ordered automatically (usually by name).
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Ah, and a note so you won’t be surprised: the widgets you have at the moment in your sidebar are just a default suggestion – once you take over by adding widgets yourself, they’ll disappear.
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Hey I managed to get a category called “News Sources” set up and they currently appear on my sidebar. I did it!!! I’ll think about the widget part later because I still don’t understand why I need it or would want it – I’m just now getting the link and category part down pat.
Thank you for all your help. OMG, I feel so proud of myself. :)
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Now that you did it, maybe it’s time for an extra tip! If you want your links to open in a new window (so that one doesn’t really leave your blog), scroll down to “Advanced Options” when you write or manage a link and select “Target: blank”.
And which “widget part” is it that you don’t understand?
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I hovered the mouse over most of the links and they show a little window that gives a tiny picture of the web site itself. Is that what you are talking about when you say “open in a new window”??
I guess I don’t understand what the widget is supposed to do for me/the sidebar (or where ever I’d use it). Apparently the sidebar has some kind of widget software on it already because if I understand correctly I wouldn’t be able to get the links and categories to post properly without that software. Am I correct?? If I wanted a picture of me or my kids in the sidebar, would that be considered a widget??? Is a widget for the sidebar only??
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No, the hover-over picture is the snap preview; it can be annoying, so if you don’t like that feature you can go to Design>Extras and disable it (it’s erroneously called “Snap Shots” there). Links opening in a new window means opening in a separate window of your browser instead of taking the place of your blog.
Widgets add various functions to your sidebar, most of them clickable (you can see the full list and experiment with them in Design>Widgets). Yes you are correct, you already have some of them working for you: all the items in your sidebar are due to widgets.
A picture itself would not be a widget – but in order to have a picture in the sidebar you do need a widget: you must upload the picture somewhere, then add a Text widget and put a special kind of link to the picture in it.
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Ok, I think I understand better now. Thanks! I’m going to give it a try and see how it works out. Thank you again for all your help. Have a great day!!
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