sidebar help

[Kinembe]

ok, i want to create a website that i will be adding to over time. i want to be able to make changes(add a link) in my sidebar and have it reflected in all the pages in my site without changing it on every page.

how can this be done?

i'm sure i need to learn some new stuff, but i need it to work like this.

[wige]

There are a few different ways to do it, but they all depend on what your server can handle, and how you will be developing your site. For example, if you intend to build a static html site, the best way would be to use Server Site Includes, assuming your site is on an Apache server. You would, however, need to check with your hosting provider to make sure SSI is supported.

Otherwise, if you are going to be using PHP to make a dynamic site, you can use PHP includes to include the contents of another file in the page.

[Kinembe]

just a static site, but plan on adding pages over time. i use lunarpages hosting and yes it is an apache and supports ssi.

any recommended reading or tutorials? or advice, i have a basic knowledge of html, but not much more.

[wige]

This is the comprehensive official starters guide to using SSI on an Apache server: Apache Tutorial: Introduction to Server Side Includes - Apache HTTP Server

Basically, the two things you need to know are what SSI does, which in your case will consist of embedding the contents of an external text file into the document being served to the client, and how to do it.

To create an SSI page, you need to use .shtml as the extension, instead of .html. That tells the server to look for SSI components. You would then create a text file that has the contents you want to embed in your various pages. On the page you want to embed the content into, you would add: <!--#include virtual="/path/to/text/file.html" --> where you want the file contents to be placed. That string will then be replaced with the contents of the file.
And thats pretty much it.

[Kinembe]

seems simple enough, gonna give it a try, thanks.

[ExtremeEzine.com]

I may be over simplifying things but have you considered a WordPress blog format? It's a simply task to make a nice blog theme look like it isn't a blog while keeping the blog features. Sidebar and widget controls are a breeze.

[myfreelance]

Why don't you a create a page where you can do all the modifications in your site. Usually the page that contains all the functions of your site is function.php or configuration.php then in return you will just call this function to all of your pages so that it will appear in every pages of your site.