Dynamic Widgets

FAQ

What are the (system) requirements to use this plugin?

1. A properly working WordPress site (doh!).
2. Your theme must have at least one dynamic sidebar.
3. Your theme must call wp_head().
4. Minimum of PHP version 5.2.7 is required. PHP 5.3 is highly recommended.

I’m not sure if my theme is calling `wp_head()`. Can I check?

Yes, you can. In the Dynamic Widgets Overview page, click the ‘Advanced >’ link at the bottom. You should see if wp_head() is called in your theme. It is possible that Dynamic Widgets can’t detect if the theme is calling wp_head(). Please contact the author of the theme to ask for this. You can also, of course, just try Dynamic Widgets to see if it works.

Does the plugin work on a WordPress Network?

Yes, but only if you activate the plugin on a per site base. Network Activation is not supported.
Extra note: It seems that sometimes for some reason DW does not show up on individual sites within a WP Network without a network activation. You can use Multisite Plugin Manager to overcome this problem.

I checked the “Make exception rule available to individual posts and tags” option, but nothing happens.

Did you save the options? If you did, you might try hitting the (i) icon over to the right and read the text which appears below.

What do you mean by logical AND / OR?

A logical AND means that ALL rules must be met before the action takes place.
A logical OR means that when ANY rule is met, the action takes place.

According to the feature list I should be able to use a hierarchical structure in static pages, but I don’t see it. Where is it?

You probably have more than 500 pages. Building a tree with so many pages slows down the performance of the plugin dramatically. To prevent time-out errors, the child-function has been automatically disabled. You can, however, raise this limit by clicking on the ‘Advanced >’ link at the bottom of the Widgets Overview page and raise the number next to the Page limit box.

The plugin slows down the loading of a page dramatically. Can you do something about it?

Try setting the plugin to the ‘OLD’ method. You can do this by clicking on the ‘Advanced >’ link at the bottom of the Widgets Overview page and checking the box next to ‘Use OLD method’. See if that helps. Setting the plugin to use the ‘OLD’ method comes with a downside, unfortunately. It may leave you with a visible empty sidebar.

I want to check if the ‘OLD’ method suits me better. Is there a way back if it doesn’t?

Yes! You can switch between the FILTER and OLD method without any loss of the widgets’ configuration whatsoever.

I want the sidebar to be empty in Page X, but instead several widgets are shown in that sidebar. Am I doing something wrong?

Your theme probably uses a ‘default display widgets policy’. When a sidebar becomes empty, the theme detects this and places widgets in it by default. The plugin can’t do anything about that. Ask the theme creator how to fix this.

I’m using WPEC 3.8 or higher and I don’t see the WPEC Categories option anymore. Where is it?

Since version 3.8, WPEC uses the WordPress provided Custom Post Types and Custom Taxonomies. Dynamic Widgets supports Custom Post Types and Custom Taxonomies. You’ll find the WPEC Categories under the ‘Categories (Products)’ section.

You asked me to create a dump. How do I do that?

• Click at the bottom of the Widgets Overview page on the ‘Advanced >’ link.
• Now a ‘Create dump’ button appears a bit further below.
• Click that button.
• Save the text file.
• Remember where you saved it.

How do I completely remove Dynamic Widgets?

• Click at the bottom of the Widgets Overview page on the ‘Advanced >’ link.
• Now an ‘Uninstall’ button appears a bit further below.
• Click that button.
• Confirm you really want to uninstall the plugin. After the cleanup, the plugin is deactivated automatically.
• Remove the ‘dynamic-widgets’ directory from inside the /wp-content/plugins/ directory.