Install Extra WordPresses as Pages
If you’re tired of only having one blog page on your WordPress site (and there are reasons to want more than one) then don’t fear - WordPress meshing to the rescue. What do I mean by that term meshing? I guess an example is the best way to explain.
This page of my site is the blogging section - or you might call it the current news on your site. But I also wanted to have the same funtionality on separate pages of the same site, particularly with photography and drawing. How cool would it be to have each of these three pages run as an actual blog? Way cool… then I realised it was really simple.
First I have to admit I have a WAY lot of space on my server account at Tashosting thanks to Brett Drinkwater’s generosity. Second I should confess to having way too much time on my hands some mornings. Third you’ll need permission in your account to have another 2 databases running. So the solution was quick and easy.
- Installed two more WordPresses into their own folders in the root directory - one for photography and one for drawing
- Got my original theme for this site and made a copy (new version) for the two new WordPress installations
- In this new copy theme I stripped all the extra folders - gone are the extra stylesheets, graphics folders, and javascript etcetera from the original theme so all that remains is the style.css file and other php templates of the theme
- Remove all extra functionality you don’t require on the new theme’s index.php - I removed the search function and pages navigation links
- If you have a content rich footer with stuff in it like mine then think about culling it like I have but you may want to dig deeper to suit your own needs
- Upload and install the new themes folders to their respective new locations and activate them in the Presentation tab of WordPress admin
Remember, you don’t want these new themes showing their own pages or other functionality - just one page would suffice. Also, for consistency, I cut and pasted my horizontal navigation bar into the new themes.
The good part about all that is the respective themes in your subdirectories (photography and drawing) are going to automatically use the main theme’s stylesheets etcetera. If you have any trouble its simple enough to wire it up so it all works fine but I’d expect it all to work straight out of the box without your intervention.
Why would you want to do this in the real world? Well say you’re designing for a small business which wants to post latest news articles (the main blog) but also wants the ability to put the latest deals or specials on other product pages. By using multiple installations on the same site you can very quickly generate a situation where the necessary pages come automatically with their own area specific search functionality and syndication feeds.
Anyway I guess as long as you have the room and a supportive host who doesn’t charge you by the database then its always a quick and easy option if you’re asked by a client.
