How to use the presentation page columns

WordPress Tutorials

Our themes include a special way of defining presentation page columns contents. This method allows for an infinite number of columns (and improved support for multi-language plugins).

The theme comes with 6 sample columns when no content is yet set. These 6 columns will disappear once you start adding your own content.

To get started, navigate to theme’s settings page, eg. Appearance > [Theme] Settings.

tempera-ppcol1

Open the Presentation Page section to see all its options (make sure the presentation page itself is enabled if you intend to use the slider and/or columns). Scroll down to the Presentation Page Columns group of options.

tempera-ppcol2

A. The first (and most important) option is choosing the source for the columns content:

  1. manually defined content – Widget Columns
  2. automatically generated from:
  • latest posts from all categories
  • random posts from all categories
  • sticky posts from all categories
  • latest posts from a category
  • random posts from a category
  • specific posts or pages (by IDs)

B. Defines the number of columns per row the theme should display. Add the right number of columns so they correctly divide to the value you set here. Also make sure your content fits if you set a large number of columns per row.

C. Lets you set the height of the column image. The width is dependent on the total theme width and the number of columns per row, so this is automatically computed. Use these numbers when you create and upload your column images.

D. Defines the column button text.

Navigate to Appearance > Widgets.
Note the Cryout Column (E) widget and the Presentation Page Columns (F) widget area.

tempera-ppcol3

Drag and drop a Cryout Column widget to the Presentation Page Columns widget area. This will open up the widgets field so you can start adding content to your first column.

tempera-ppcol4

  • Column image URL – type in manually or select image from the Library. Respect the suggested image size or your columns will look distorted.
  • Column title – enter column title or leave blank to hide
  • Column text – enter column text or leave blank to hide
  • Column link – enter link columns sends to on lick or leave blank to disable
  • Check box to open the link in a new window/tab.

When done click Save and your new column should become visible on the frontend.

To make sure your posts are valid for columns content, check that the selected posts:

  • have a featured image set; the image should be correct size as set in the Columns settings (or larger so that WordPress can generate the needed crops)
  • have a title (if you wish them to display a title)
  • have content (if you wish the content to be displayed as column text)

The columns will link to the posts themselves. There is currently no way to define custom links.

Note: These instructions apply to Tempera, Nirvana and Parabola (since v1.7).

More Tutorials This article is part of our WordPress general and theme specific tutorials series. For more useful information check out our tutorials section.

163 Comments

  1. Hi,
    I have changed the 4 products per page on 3 to display bigger pictures but there is something wrong-probably on the template function.
    With shortcodes-inside the pages the products display is OK -3 products and big pictures as they are set.But Is not posssible to display the same size of the pictures in “category” and “brand” filters or the search inside the website.Any idea where can be set this picture size settings(WC,WP and Thumbnails are OK and already set)
    Thank you

  2. Hello,
    I would like to ask how is possible to show 3 products per row on any brand or product page.I mad all modifications seen in WC or inside Tempera and wc template function on my server but is not working,always shows 4 products (not talking just for the presentation page)
    Thank you very much

    (About the rest of the template and the functions I think tha is one of the best templates ever)

  4. untrue Tempera ONLY allows for 4 columns but as many rows as you need be nifty if we werent so restricted in some areas on the presentation page this IMHO is where your themes suffer lots of things you can do but not much additional that you can do to the page adding blocks of content or product categories blocks of tect/html love your themes but man what I would give for a more flexible presentation page

    1. In Tempera we named the boxes that are displayed columns – meaning there can be an unlimited number of boxes (columns), arranged in a grid of 1 to 4 columns and any number of rows.

  6. Thanks for reply, when someone is navigating through the page… lets say someone has clicked on about us page and now wants to go back to home page or presentation page… how does that work as you cant have presentation page on the menu as a home page, I cant figure that out!!!

    Regards

  9. I need help as well. My columns were fine until I tried to add another widget from another plug in. Now it messed up my top widget and I have been trying to get it back to the top of the page but having no luck. Help

  10. How can i modify the columns to hide the oldest? example i have more than 10 columns but i want to show 6 and the other 4 load when the users press more… Like the functionality on posts

  11. Hi is there a way to use the images that come with the columns on the Nirvana theme presentation page and just change the text and links on them?
    I LOVE this theme by the way. Lots of coffee money coming your way soon!

    1. Did you ever find out how to fix this, Susan? I’ve been trying to find out how to remedy this for more than a year and I doubt I’ll ever figure it out. The animated text looks great, but not when it displays improperly and you can’t even read the title because it cuts itself off from coming in too high over the photo. I’ve had to turn off the animated feature because it’s not worth it.

  13. Crayout colums were great till today… Atfer a few days of three horizontal columns, that suddenly change the place and now are verticaly posiotioned on my presentation page. Could you help me to solve this problem? I have tried everything I can thing about and nothing helped. I checked settings through Nirvana Setting – Presentation Page and Wigdet Crayout Columns.

  14. Is there a way where we can specifically adjust the size of the title(text) appearing above the columns? Alternatively, is there a way we can take the column title from above to beneath the column picture?

    The issue is that the text is above the columns. If the text is slightly longer, it flows in to the next line pushing the column picture downwards. As a result, the column pictures in a row do not align each other if the text length is different.

  20. Hi,

    When having the tempera presentation page columns on default (no custom cryout column is being used) the “read more” button is visible. After implementing a custom cryout column, the picture and text is visible but the “read more” button is not. I can’t also find the code line anymore.

    Any ideas? I haven’t changed the presentation page column settings.

    Please advice.

    Thanks,

    Jason

  21. I have loaded my Nirvana site to my host and all the headers and pages are showing up except for the presentation page – it is the generic one and not the one I customized. I have cleared the cache and disabled the plug ins, but no luck. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

  22. Hi is it possible to have multple columns? Like multiple text area’s Text 1. text 2. text 3.

    Is it possible to have Column1 , columns2, etc, instead of the texts.

  23. Hi, I have one problem with the columns on the presentation page. I use 6 specific posts and till one hours ago everything was fine but now it shows only the first 2 of the 6 posts on the presentation page and the other 4 it doesn’t show anymore. here the website http://clean9-vital.com

  24. Hi, for whatever reason, there’s no place to enter “Read More” text for the presentation page columns? It just doesn’t show up in my wordpress dashboard. Everything else works like a charm, but I’d like to be able to have text to work with the links. Thanks

    1. Sally – Have you solved this yet? If not, go to Appearance, Tempera Settings, Presentation Page and then scroll down to Presentation Page Columns. Insert ‘Read More’ or other appropriate words for the words to appear on mouseover. Hope that helps.
      Andrew

      1. Hi,

        I was out of town, but just got back. I did solve it, but a little differently than you recommend. And I should have been more clear: I’m using Nirvana not Tempera, although I know they are similar.

        Thanks,
        Sally

  25. I am using Nirvana. I’m having a problem with the presentation page columns. I have it set for “Latest posts from Category” (Works well) and Column Display as “Animated”. When the Browser is set at “Maximize” all is fine. The text appears over the column images with a mouse over. However, when the browser is set to “Restore Down” (Not Maximized) the text appears as static below the images. I would like for it to remain animated no mater what the browser setting.

  27. How do you get a single image to display across all cryout boxes like in the sample view. I see how to upload individual images for each cryout box, but I would prefer one image to make it more sleek and cohesive- thanks!

  28. Hello again … I do not know how this happened, but all of a sudden everything was displayed correctly. I am wondering if my hoster was a bit slow but my problem is solved now.

  29. Randy, when you have created the cryout columns (in the widget area) you need to add the url back to the appropriate gallery/page in the box that says “Link:” I am an utter novice at this website stuff but have the images on our presentation page linking to galleries and other pages no problem at all.

  30. Hi,

    I use the “Latest posts from category” option for the columns on the presentation page, and the latest posts from my chosen category appear on each column of the presentation page but all the formatting (simple ones like bold and line breaks) have disappeared and it’s just a blob of text.

    The FAQ mentioned that there is some sanitisation going on but the 6 default sample texts that appear when using the “Widget Columns” have still their formatting kept.

    How do I keep my posts formatted when they appear in the column on the presentation page?

    Best regards
    RJ

    1. Columns (and the slider) display the excerpts of posts (as WordPress renders them). If you want formatting there, you need to set custom excerpts for those particular posts.

This article is closed to new comments.