Perhaps you can just comment on the present category bar2 in Atahualpa. I find a multi-level category bar quite cumbersome - (that is what i presently have) It keeps growing every day as i add categories. I've tried the count option and it doesn't seem to do anything as well.

I know I'm repeating it again but i also have a sidebar category list box where all of the categories are shown and are clickable.
I'm tempted to just eliminate the awkward cat bar 2.

I would build a hierarchy of categories with no more than about 8-10 top level cats. I would also consolidate categories as much as practical. Could you please post the link to your site?

You have virtually answered my question. The assumption is that the number of categories are assumed to be limited. In my application that is exactly contrary to what makes it special, the categories are thought provoking. They are not the ordinary that you may observe and they could be very large in number. That is exactly why I would like to have a scrolling marquee and a sidebar listbox (which I have)
The marquee would grab your attention with stimulating categories and the list box would allow to find what you want and click away.

There may be one other way, that is a line at a time with the ability to click on a right down arrow which would give you another line of categories. Sort of like a parallel list box. Not as good as a marquee but a compromise.

Sorry, I'm not ignoring your request for a link but for the present time I am keeping it available for certain people but confidential.

I appreciate the dialog - its helpful.

As far as the marquee is concerned, I do believe we're almost there with the suggestions made by JuggleDaddy. However since knowledge of the internals of Atahualpa is limited to just a few people it's difficult to know where to place code.

What you are describing is tags, not categories.

Imilesw

Just one last question. On your earlier reply you said that on a whim you used <marquee>%cat</marquee> in the configure header area and the marquee scroll worked for you. Does this mean you saw the categories scrolling? I tried the same and i saw a blank scrolling bar, there were no categories.

If you actually saw categories being displayed there must be something else in your configuration that had an effect.


This is secondary but tags or categories its a matter of perception. To me tags are used for search engines to find web sites and categories are part of the CMS application using categories and posts.

I did indeed see the categories although they were unclickable. When I talk about tags I am really referring more to tag clouds which can show categories in a cloud widget depending on the plugin used. Some of them even move. You might want to do a search through the WordPress.org plugins for tag cloud and try a few. They may be what you are looking for. And as I mentioned some of them let you use categories in the cloud. I would also research WordPress tags as I still think they may be more appropriate for what you are trying to accomplish but it would take a bit of playing around with them to see if they would work for you.

It's obvious where a catalog marquee would appear but I'm not sure where i would place a category cloud but I'll give some thought to it.

However, lets go back to the fact that you did see categories in the scrolling marquee because i didn't. There must be something in your header config that is different from mine. I have %pages %bar1 %logo %cats %bar2 %image and of course some other styling. I'd like to determine why it was working on your system and not on mine. The only other set up besides the header config is the bar2 styling - can you tell me what you are using. Any thoughts on this anomoly? I would be satisfied if it scrolled the categories w/o being clickable.

Actually the buttons are clickable. The following is what I have in my Configure Header Area at my test site.
It seems to work in Firefox and Chrome. In Opera the links are not clickable and in IE8 the scrolling behavior doesn't work well.

Larry

have no idea what
<?php bfa_widget_area('name=My new widget area'); ?> is

but i tried it and it did not work. Still have a blank scrolling marquee??

Getting late - tomorrows another day.

Alfie

The only thing that was important in that line was

Imilesw

I downloaded category- order. Tried the drag and drop re-ordering of categories and saved but when i returned to web site nothing changes. In addition to re-ordering i would like to maintain the bar menu at only one level which is about 6 categories but the plugin does not seem to have capability to limit category count. But first re-ordering does not work ???

Also tried the ATO count option to limit it to 6 but that also does not change anything???

WP 2.9.2, Atahualpa 3.4.6
php 5.1

Did you download Category Order or My Category Order? If it was Category Order I would suggest trying My Category Order as this is more up to date.

To maintain the category bar level to only one just don't use any sub categories.

Imilesw

I did download category order. I notice that My Category Order refers to sidebar and not the bar2 menu that i am using? Should i try it anyhow?

In regards to keeping bar level at 1, I am using sub-categories, it would take a big change to eliminate sub-categories and the number of categories would grow even larger.

Are you telling me that the count option does not work.

I would try My Category Order. As for the counts are you saying you have more than 6 levels of sub categories like the following? If you only have a bunch of categories with one level of subcategories under them then the count set at 6 would have no effect.

Category
SubCategory
SubSubCategory
SubSubSubCategory
SubSubSubSubCategory
SubSubSubSubSubCategory

On the subject of the count option, I presently have 14 categories, 1 has 3 sub category levels and a second has 2 sub category levels - all other are single category.
Rather than have you interpret each situation i would prefer to know the algorithm since it may change with time.

I will try the plug in my category order.

In your case alfie your setting the count limit to 6 does nothing since at the most you have 3 sub category levels. That count setting is used to limit the number of sub categories that show not the number of items within a category.

I downloaded My category order and it worked very well. One down two to go.
Thanks, i now understand the limitations of the count option. It is related to sub categories.

I stll must find a way top limit the number of top level categories that are shown to prevent an excessive number of levels from appearing. I nowwhave two which is ok but there may be more.

Can you now see why i wanted the scrolling marquee.


Now for the bigee. Being able to modify the code when necessary. My experience has been with C, C++ and visual Basic (object oriented programming) It's hard for me to recall an incident where I was unable to modify code to accomplish my objectives. PHP is new to me but I've been able to navigate and make small changes. My problem is that i do not understand the architecture of wordpress/Atahualpa which is vital to knowing where the code canbe found to make the changes. The forums are good but there are cases, as you can see, where I am left to find my own solution. Without a good tutorial on wordpress/theme architecture, this task is extremely time consuming or almost impossible.

I'm considering opening a new thread on wordpress/Atahualpa troubleshooting and modification.

There are so many options made available without coding in Atahualpa, you may not need to do much coding. That said, you can simply open up any of the php files in the theme and see what's what. functons.php is sort of the nerve center of the theme, I guess.

The wordpress.org codex is full of information. I'm sure there are entire books on it too, although it's changing so fast, I'd think it best to stick with updated website tutorials.

You really shouldn't modify the Wordpress code itself unless you want real pain.

Hi Paulae

We meet again. We were also having a discussion in the thread "Themeframe fort other CMSs". We were discussing Wordpress Atahualpa Architecture and problem troubleshooting. You had just mentionbed that options may be saved in the wordpress DB. I browsed thru the wordpress DB and looked ion wo_options which I see acts as a scratch pad memory interface. Could not sdee many of the options used in the ATO.

An example is always the best way to navigate. If you have read the prior posts in this thread you would have seen a discussion on using a marquee for the bar2 menu in the header. Note that we were trying to trace the %cat option sandwiched between <marquee>%cat</marquee> which gave us some degree of success but in my case a scrolling marquee without any categories %cat. Where is %cat. How do i trouble shoot this problem. Note that Juggledaddy recommended adding some code which did not work. I have a feeling that if we attempted to troubleshoot this anomoly a great deal could be learned.

I've tried doing a great deal of seaching for tutorials on architecture and troubleshooting but I have found very little.

I'm a novice when it comes to database issues, so I'll defer to Juggledad's greater knowledge on that. I do know that many of the Atahualpa rows in the wp-option table, have the preface bfa.

I've installed a plugin called Marquee-Plus. I gave it a test message. I then used PHP to add it under the header image. I'm doing this just to show you how easy it can be to add functionality to Atahualpa without digging into the code.

In Atahualpa theme options, Style and Edit Header area, I pasted the following under %image: .

You can see it in action: http://profilet.com

Since you mentioned marqueeplus1 lets go one step further. Juggledad had recommended some code to display the categories instead of a text message and included the same echo line in the header bar config. Unfortunately it did not work and hung up the system. I had to restore by using a backup copy. No way to trouble without having the conventional breakpoint and watch tools?

Years ago when we had nothing more than DOS, we used print statements (similiar to echo - to troubleshoot) however with a web site - where do we print. would be nice if the echo statement could print to a footer line.

Troubleshooting seems to be a weakness in wordpress.

You can put echo statements in the code any where you want makIng sure to honor the php/HTML convention. I do it all the time.

what you don't seem to understand is that Wordpress is an application that is written in PHP and uses MySql for it's database. Go get a book about PHP and then read the wordpress documentation or it's code if you want to make major changes.

Maybe you should read about plugins and write one to do what you want, a Category Marquee. You can find lots of explanation on how to write plugins at wordpress.org and on the web, just do a google search. let us know when you have the plugin working.

Juggledad

I have been at this application now for a few months. Never heard of php or Wordpress before that. My main objective was acting as an author and editor. I selected wordpress on a suggestion from a colleague who had read that it was a tool similiar to Visual Basic and C++ which minimized the need of the developer to write code and if a new requirement arose the forums provided a good source of information. However i found on occasion I had to make some minor changes in the wordpress code. This was acceptable.
I am jumping back and forth attempting to act as marketeer, author, editor and programmer and must assign my own priorities or I will get nothing done. I am trying to live with what exists in Atahualpa while continuing to improve on the WEB site with new plugins or simple coding changes if I can. To this extent I have been trying to use the forums as a tool. When I can get help I appreciate it and will show it by donations, in addition I have tried to help others who are experiencing problems that I have been lucky to overcome.
I say lucky because it is not always easy to know exactly where to look in the code in order to place an echo command or where on the theme the output can be displayed. As I said it would be helpful if the theme allowed a text box below the footer for troubleshooting and display.

Not understanding the architecture of wordpress + Atahualpa makes things more difficult. I can't tell you how many times I ask direct questions and find that I don't receive any feedback - when I repeat myself it becomes very awkward. (Hard to understand) I haven't as yet seen any books on this subject. I have primarily depended upon w3schools as a php learning tool. Apparently i may seem to be imposing by attempting to get help but I thought that was the purpose of the forums.

Just one more piece of information. I am eighty years old - I started on this project in an attempt to help my grandson get started on an application that would be suitable for him and which I could support. Sorry to make this a biography but at this point it may be easier for you to understand. I have tried to find a programmer to collaborate on this project but i find that most people have short term objectives and need that immediate pay check rather than a bundle down the road. So as you can see I'm trying to be superman - to accomplish anything I must establish priorities for each task. Yes I could attempt to write a category marquee plugin (which if necessary i can do without). I may not have too much time left so I have to use what i have prudently. To add to that I am still working full time.

My hope is to get this on line to be reviewed by some prospective investors so that I will have funds available to pass off the creation of a company to some young people while I remain in support as necessary.

" Now you know the rest of the story "

When one uses a free tool, one needs to work within the bounds of the tool. If one wants to change the way the tool works, one needs to be prepared to do a lot of work or to pay someone to do that work for them, no matter what age or what is motivating them.

Juggledad

I do understand your message but as much as I tried to clearly explain my schedule and priorities I’m not quite sure if I got through. I understand that you are able and willing to solve the scrolling category marquee problem but for a price. You have also suggested that I read some books on php, which I have. However there are no books that discuss the internals of wordpress and Atahualpa integration – add to this mysql. I tried to ask some pointed questions during our dialogue to give me some insight as to how Atahualpa saves and retrieves the option data which I believe is related to the missing category data but for some reason no response was forthcoming. Obviously I can’t afford to go off on a long journey to re-invent the wheel. There appears to be several people who with little effort could save me a great deal of time with just a few words. This would make this task much easier and place it higher on my priority list. Without this knowledge there are many other tasks to complete first.

I’m not sure just what your business plan is but I must say that helping others to use your products successfully would place BFA in a position to share in the rewards of their users success and with this, open the doors for virtually unlimited consulting opportunities . To ask for a payment from those that are struggling appears to be self defeating. I don’t wish to appear unappreciative because that is not the case. I may not have completely understood what wordpress and Atahualpa was all about but at the present time I have taken that path and must stick with it. In doing that, while my knowledge increases I will try to stick with the mantra of “sharing and caring for others”

I just tried something and it worked for me in all browsers although IE didn't work as well but it did work.

• I installed Marquee Plus
• I put the php code for Marquee plus in place of %cats in the Configure Header Area box
• I put %cats in the first box in Marquee Plus settings
• I set the width for Marquee Plus to work with the width of my theme

All done and in my setup the links are clickable.

Alfie, I am a volunteer on this forum, Flynn is the developer and owner of the Atahualpa code. There are hundreds of request per week thak I 'could' get into and actually write the code/css and for many I do. Flynn made me a moderator because of the number of answers I've given. I am happy to give each forum member a small portion of my time, but when it starts to get too large, I have to bow out unless you want to hire me. If someone does hire me, they get my priority over answering questions on teh boards. People that have previously donated get a higher level of my support than someone who hasn't or promises to do so in the future.

We all have schedules and priorities, mine are not yours as yours are not mine.

I have several times thought about writting an in-depth guide to Atahualpa and wordpress, but I keep asking myself, how much time would I have to spend to do it correctly and then how much would I gain from it, ie would it be cost effective for me to do it. The answer so far has been 'no'.

Remember this is a free theme, the only way that Flynn will continue to develop it is if people give him donations. I keep answering questions because people donate to me.

Imiles

Thanks for your interest, I will try to repeat your efforts. However, there is a certain amount of ambiguity in your post, please help me to clarify before i proceed.

Juggledad recommended some code several posts back- here it is below:
------------------------------
ok, here is a solution for you
1) get and install 'Marquee-Plus'
2) edit the plugin code Marquee-plus.php and replace line 19 - which is

HTML Code:
$marqueeplus_value_1 = html_entity_decode(get_option('marqueeplus_nrc_tex t1'), ENT_COMPAT);with

HTML Code:
$marquee_cat= '';
$categories= get_categories();
foreach ($categories as $cat) {
$marquee_cat .= $cat->cat_name.' - ';
}
$marqueeplus_value_1 = $marquee_cat; 3) add '<?php echo show_marqueeplus1(); ?>' to ATO->Style & edit HEADER AREA->Configure Header Area
4) edit the Marquee-Plus options:
a) set 'Text 1: Is Feed (Yes/No)?' to 'NO'
b) set 'Text 1: Direction (LEFT/RIGHT/UP/DOWN): ' to what ever you want
(leave width blank to go the full width of the page)
----------------------------
What were you referring to in place of %cats in ATO header config

IS IT THE HTML CODE ABOVE OR WAS IT
<?php echo show_marqueeplus1(); ?>
------------------------------

when you said you put %cats in the marquee plus settings are you referring to the Text1 box.

My width is the length of the screen which juggledaddy said a blank input would work.



I presently have reduced the number of categories so that i only have two cat bars. however since the app allows users to add categories (approved by the editor) I'm concerned that it can grow.

Thanks again, I await your reply before i proceed.

Juggledad

I understand completely and I do appreciate everything you have contributed. However if you are able to make a quick reply to a question that does not consume much of your time that would also be appreciated. I do hope that i can get this project going so that I can use your expertise in the future and share some of the rewards. In the meantime I will try to contribute by means of donations whenever i can.

Sincerely,

Alfie

Why can't you just use the PHP short code the plugin author suggests, and put that in the header configuration line? That's what I did...very simple.

Here is my suggested procedure. To test this procedure do not mix with other procedures.

• Get and Install Marquee Plus
• In ATO->Style & edit HEADER AREA->Configure Header Area take out %cats and replace with
  HTML Code:

  ---

  <?php echo show_marqueeplus1(); ?>

  ---

• Put %cats in the Text 1 box in the Marquee Plus settings
• Do not edit any code with this suggested solution
• You may have to adjust the height and width of Text Box 1 in the Marquee Plus settings to fit your menu layout

Imiles

I tried the changes you suggested and unfortunately they did not work?

The only item you did not specify was in marqueeplus1 plugin Is feed (yes/no) I tried with both

When I set it to Yes with all the other changes you recommended.

I observed an error: no such file or directory in marquee-plus.php line 207 I checked this out, it was implode("", file($ur");
A second error, "Invalid arguments passed in"

changing Isfeed to No I then observed no scroll marquee and no bar menus.

Removed all changes I'm back to a bar2 cat menu bar.

Puzzling, isn't it. But that's because we are using trial and error without understanding what we are doing. I'm a persistant son of a gun so I haven't given up yet (must pursue implode function) but for the moment i have to put on my editor hat.

Thanks for playing detective.

Alfie

line 207 should read you may want to reinstall it since it looks messed up (unless you made a typo)

It was just a typo.

addendum to thread on scrolling marquee.

I tried using all the recommendations suggested by imilesw on another computer having firefox and explorer browsers. Lo and behold I now saw the scrolling category browser. However the bar2 category menu still remained above the marquee. It appears that this is browser related, or in the case of the explorer browser one of the settings may have an effect.
I also tried different combinations of %bar2 and %cats in the ATO header config but the category bar menu did not disappear.

Can anyone provide any comments.


Alfie

correction:

scrolling category browser should be scrolling category marquee.

alfie

This may just confuse the issue, but I love this marquee effect:

http://www.ustream.tv/user/leolaporte

It is the same across the site, but I am a fan of Leo. the javascript is below, but since I know nothing of javascript, I cannot modify it to get it to work at all. It is so elegant, someone might have the talent and incentive to tweak it. If that person could share with the group, they would be my hero.

----------------------------------

<script type="text/javascript">Ustream.Vars.isLive="true";Ustream.Var s.locale="en_US";Ustream.Vars.loggedInUserId=0;Ust ream.Vars.initialNotificationData={"items":[{"id":"2","text":"Broadcasting live is as easy as 1,2,3. Get started today!","onclick":"$('#signupShow').click();","lin k":"#","breaking":"0"},{"id":"10","text":"Ustre am Producer allows you to broadcast in higher quality. Try it free!","onclick":"","link":"\/producer","breaking":"0"},{"id":"11","text":"Downl oad Ustream's viewer application for your mobile phone to watch your favorite streams on the go!","onclick":"","link":"http:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/WebObjects\/MZStore.woa\/wa\/viewSoftware?id=301520250&mt=8","breaking":"0"},{" id":"12","text":"Download Ustream's broadcasting application for your mobile phone, go live from anywhere.","onclick":"","link":"\/mobile","breaking":"0"},{"id":"13","text":"Follow @Ustream on Twitter to get alerts on celebrity broadcasts, red carpet events, and more!","onclick":"","link":"http:\/\/twitter.com\/ustream","breaking":"0"},{"id":"30","text":"Creati ng highlights from your recordings gives people a snapshot of your content. Create a highlight today!","onclick":"","link":"http:\/\/www.ustream.tv\/discovery\/highlight","breaking":"0"}],"lastId":"30","flag":3,"refreshInterval":120}; Ust ream.Vars.v3=false;Ustream.Vars.pageId="User_Detai ls";Ustream.Vars.loggedIn=false;Ustream.Vars.log ge dInWithFacebook=false;Ustream.Vars.pageUrl="\/user\/leolaporte";Ustream.Vars.staticUrl="http:\/\/cdn2.ustream.tv\/";Ustream.Vars.imagesToPreload=["http:\/\/cdn2.ustream.tv\/static\/images\/ajax-loader-small:16422.gif","http:\/\/cdn2.ustream.tv\/static\/images\/ajax-loader-big:16422.gif"];Ustream.Vars.appliedRevshare=false;Ustream.Vars.r evshareConditionsMet=null;Ustream.Vars.needTwitter Auth=true;Ustream.Vars.broadcastProperties=[];Ustream.Vars.broadcastNowUrl="\/get-started";
</script> <!--[if lte IE 7]>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://cdn2.ustream.tv/static/js/dd_rounded:26081.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript">
DD_roundies.addRule('.rounded', '5px');
DD_roundies.addRule('.showHeader .nextEvent', '0px 0px 5px 5px');

</script>
<![endif]-->