MyCustomWidget

302 Comments

1. Ben

   1 Feb ’10 at 21:55

   Oops, looks like it stripped the code – it’s the first example using ‘posts list with offset’

   -b

   Reply
2. Janek

   1 Feb ’10 at 22:04

   Hi Ben.

   I don’t think I really understood what your widget tries to do or what the problem is. Maybe you can send me the coding via email.
   Nevertheless: This sounds like a very common issueregarding multible loops. If you use a loop inside of your widget the loop that should work for the content area will be affected as well.

   You might want to take a look at this post: http://wordpress.org/support/topic/263448

   Reply
3. Ben

   4 Feb ’10 at 14:06

   Hi Janek,

   Thanks for getting back to me – that post might be the answer, I’ll check it out and get back to you.

   Cheers,

   Ben

   Reply
4. Hannes

   19 Feb ’10 at 13:57

   Hallo, hatte viel Freue mit dem Addon, welches ich in einer MU-Installation verwendet. Nach dem Update auf die letzte Version kann ich nur die MCPlugins eines Blogs speichern, die der anderen Blogs verschwinden. Wenn ich dann im anderen Blog in MCPlugins Save all verwende, verschwinden jene vom ersten Blog. Was habe ich falsch gemacht???

   Reply
5. Hannes

   9 Mar ’10 at 02:33

   Konnte das Problem mittlerweile selbst fixen. Auf Wunsch schicke ich gerne den modifizierten Code. Jedenfalls herzlichen Dank!

   Reply
6. Janek

   9 Mar ’10 at 07:28

   Hallo Hannes,
   Sorry, dass ich keine Zeit gefunden habe mir das Problem anzuschauen. Wenn du mir den modifizierten Code zuschickst, bin ich aber gerne bereit ihn mir anzugucken und mit aufzunehmen. So waerst du auch bei zukuenftigen Updates auf der sicheren Seite. Meine e-Mail Adresse findest du im Impressum (>> Link)

   Danke schon einmal
   Janek

   Reply
7. Michael Oeser

   12 Mar ’10 at 02:33

   Hi,

   kann man den generieren Widgetcode auch irgendwie “exportieren”. Das wäre nämlich klass, um das Plugin quasi als Widget Generator für eigene Widgets zu nutzen. Man könte damit dann sozusagen eigene Widgets erstellen, exportieren und auch auf anderen Seiten einsetzen, ohne das Plugin immer wieder zu installieren.

   Ist das irgendwie machbar?

   Reply
8. Janek

   14 Mar ’10 at 14:00

   Hallo Michael,
   prinzipiell wäre das sicherlich möglich. Das Grundgerüst wird ja bereits generiert und ist im Plugin-Folder unter my_custom_widget_classes.php zu finden. Allerdings wird der eigentliche Inhalt des Widgets in der Datenbank gespeichert und das Coding des Pflegedialogs wird aus dem Plugin selbst heraus generiert.

   Aber: Das Widget selbst müsste in jedem Fall registriert werden. So oder so benötigst du also ein Plugin. Der Mehrwert eines solchen Standalone-Widgets wäre also schon recht begrenzt (Vom Aufwand ein solches Plugin generisch zu erzeugen mal ganz abgesehen…)

   Reply
9. Aaron Lutze

   18 Mar ’10 at 02:41

   Hi there

   I am currently unable to create a widget with this plugin as when I click the Edit Widget pencil icon, nothing happens!

   Why would this be happening?

   Please help.

   Kind Regards,

   Aaron

   Reply
   • Janek

     21 Mar ’10 at 20:16

     Good question. Did you install any new plugins recently? The problem sounds like an issue with the javascript coding. Could you try to deativate javascript on the plugin’s setting page?
10. MikeTek

    24 Mar ’10 at 21:44

    Hi Janek,

    Love the plugin. I use it all the time.

    However, I ran into a problem when I recently moved a WordPress website from a subdomain to the main domain (www.).

    For whatever reason the plugin, when installed, shows up without any interactivity (none of the buttons are there). The odd thing is I’ve verified that the files are indeed there and file permissions are set properly.

    Using Firebug the code where the buttons occur is oddly faded (I’ve never seen this before). I took a screenshot:

    http://dl.dropbox.com/u/571229/ga-mycustom-screen.jpg

    I’m quite perplexed and have tried uninstalling/reinstalling the plugin several times to no avail.

    Any help would be greatly appreciated.

    Thanks,
    Mike

    Reply
    • Janek

      25 Mar ’10 at 18:28

      Okay, I will take a look at it this weekend. Hopefully I will be able to reproduce it. I guess you are using the most current WordPress version…?
11. adrienne

    26 Mar ’10 at 21:22

    Hi,
    I installed this plugin on a development site then decided I didn’t want to use it. I deactivated it and then deleted it. Unfortunately, the widget I attempted to create is still present in the admin panel of my site. I tried going into the database and eliminating it that way but “no success”. I’d really like to get rid of it as it will cause confusion for my client. How come it didn’t go away when I deleted the plugin and how do I get rid of it?!!?? Thanks in advance for the help!

    Reply
12. Janek

    27 Mar ’10 at 12:11

    Hi Adrienne,
    that sounds pretty weird. Usually deactivating the plugin should be enough to deactivate all the widgets… And deleting the complete mycustomwidget-folder should have done the trick anyway.

    To remove the plugin completely (including the corresponding entries in the database) you should
    - use the “Deinstall”-button available in the plugin’s setting section.
    - deactivate the plugin
    - remove the plugins source files

    If you follow these instructions there is no chance that the widget you created still appears.

    Reply
13. Janek

    27 Mar ’10 at 17:19

    @Mike: I was not able to reproduce the error. The faded coding implies that the are is hidden. Can you give me any more details? Which browser version do you use? which other plugins do you use? there might also be a caused by the stylesheet of your theme…

    Reply
14. Harki

    28 Mar ’10 at 07:35

    Janek,

    I lost all my Custom Widgets when upgrading to 2.0.4… They where still there in the MCW control pane – but unfortunately where gone in WPs’ widget control panel an in the sidebars concerned. Thankfully I had a copy of 2.0.3 on my localhost an was able to reinstall it on my live system – my widgets instantly re-appeard. Good luck…

    Reply
15. Janek

    28 Mar ’10 at 08:52

    Hi Harki,
    I think I know what causes the problem. Saving the widgets in the MCW control pane should have done the job. (a specific file has to be regenerated after the upgrade).

    Could you do me the favor and try this out (Just click on “Save All” in the MCW control pane)? Since there will not be any changes on database level, your widgets should be totally save (as you already experienced).

    Thanks – Janek

    Reply
16. Harki

    28 Mar ’10 at 09:03

    Could you do me the favor and try this out (Just click on “Save All” in the MCW control pane)?

    So I did – and it worked just perfectly. Upgrade to 2.0.4 -> Widgets gone, clicked “Save all” in the MCW control pane -> Widgets resurrected from Hades.

    Thank you very much for your quick and polite help.

    Reply
17. Dave

    30 Mar ’10 at 10:36

    Awesome plugin. Thanks!!

    Reply
18. Doug

    24 Apr ’10 at 22:40

    I was looking at building some widgets into the theme I made, but this will do what I wanted to do with much less effort on my part.

    Thank you!

    Reply
19. Ben

    12 May ’10 at 01:32

    Hi Janek, Awesome plugin, little problem hoping you can help, When I have registered a sidebar with “before widget” and “after widget” this plugin seems to ignore this and simply not wrap the widget in anything when trying to use the widget I created. Any Suggestions?

    Reply
20. Janek

    12 May ’10 at 12:14

    Hi Ben,

    usually it should work. but you have to make sure that you enter something as the widget’s title. The plugin works as follows:

    title=[blank] –> no “before/after widget” is used
    title=[space] –> “before/after widget” is used, but no “before/after title”
    title=”name” –> “before/after widget” and “before/after title” is used

    Let me know if you still have a problem.

    Janek

    Reply
21. Marshall

    14 May ’10 at 08:46

    Hi can a wigetize a non wigetized plugin.

    At the moment I have a print page plugin that I have to put a link into the sidebar for and it wold be much better as a widget I just drop in where I want it. Itse cleaner for the theme also.

    Marshall

    Reply
22. Janek

    14 May ’10 at 10:39

    Hi Marshall,
    You could use this plugin to create a customwidget that contains the code you would like to add to your sidebar. However: since you already have a plugin it would be more suitable to create such a widget within your own plugin.

    You might want to take a closer look at http://codex.wordpress.org/Widgets_API

    …or you simply copy (and adapt) this code to your plugin’s sourcefile

    
<?php

/**
* MyPrintWidget Class
*/
class MyPrintWidget extends WP_Widget {
/** constructor */
function MyPrintWidget() {
parent::WP_Widget(false, $name = 'MyPrintWidget');
}

/** @see WP_Widget::widget */
function widget($args, $instance) {
extract( $args );
$title = apply_filters('widget_title', $instance['title']);
?>
<?php echo $before_widget; ?>
<?php if ( $title )
echo $before_title . $title . $after_title; ?>
Add your coding here!!!
<?php echo $after_widget; ?>
<?php
}

/** @see WP_Widget::update */
function update($new_instance, $old_instance) {
return $new_instance;
}

/** @see WP_Widget::form */
function form($instance) {
$title = esc_attr($instance['title']);
?>
<p><label for="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('title'); ?>"><?php _e('Title:'); ?> <input class="widefat" id="<?php echo $this->get_field_id('title'); ?>" name="<?php echo $this->get_field_name('title'); ?>" type="text" value="<?php echo $title; ?>" /></label></p>
<?php
}

} // class MyPrintWidget

// register MyPrintWidget widget
add_action('widgets_init', create_function('', 'return register_widget("MyPrintWidget");'));

    ?>


    Reply
23. Suzy

    28 May ’10 at 12:46

    Hi Janek, really liking this plugin it’s perfect for a new site!

    perhaps this may not be related to your plugin, but something else I could do.. when I use the custom tag in the_content (in a post or such like) it’s wrapping my widget code in <p> tags which I don’t want – it’s breaking the CSS. though I don’t know why as the first <p> tag should auto close before the custom div code

    On the WP forums I found an answer was to add this:

    <?php remove_filter (‘the_content’, ‘wpautop’); ?>

    “At the top of the template where you don’t want to show the_content in a P tag”

    but, I don’t know if this is the answer and even if it is where to put it? should it go in plugin code as a mod or can I add it in my functions file..

    or indeed any other suggestions not to get the custom tag code to autowrap

    TIA

    Reply
24. Myles

    16 Jul ’10 at 10:50

    Hi Janek,

    I’m working on a WordPress site and was hoping to use the My Custom Widgets plugin to duplicate a widget called Global Translator, so I can use it on more than one sidebar. I can’t see how I go about duplicating an existing widget though?

    Can you point me in the right direction?

    Thanks,

    Myles

    Reply
25. Janek

    16 Jul ’10 at 11:17

    Hi Myles,
    in order to use this feature you will have to activate it first. Once you set the flag “Use Copy Feature” in the settings section (/wp-admin/options-general.php?page=my_custom_widget_functions.php) to “yes” a new dropdown menu will appear on the widget edit page.

    However, with the current wordpress version you should be able to use a widget several times. That is why the copy-feature was deactivated by default.

    Hope that helps…

    Janek

    Reply
26. Myles

    16 Jul ’10 at 13:22

    Hi Janek,

    I’ve selected the “copy” option and saved settings, but can’t see any drop down menu on the widgets page.

    It just lists all my widgets, plus one called MCW 2.0 Addon. I’ve upgraded to WordPress 3.0 but haven’t noticed any change in how it handles the widgets. Widgets like search and archive etc., I can use on multiple sidebars, but any additional widgets I’ve installed will disappear from the list when I drag and drop to a sidebar.

    Reply
27. bingjie

    16 Jul ’10 at 16:42

    a handy plugin..thanks

    Reply
28. Jenn

    22 Jul ’10 at 18:49

    Hi Janek,

    Thanks for the excellent plugin!

    I’m trying to create widgets that call certain posts. This code is working with the_title, but when I replace it with the_content, I get a PHP error.

    Here’s the code:
    $recent = new
    WP_Query("p=32"); while($recent->have_posts()) : $recent->the_post();?> <?php
    the_title(); ?> <?php endwhile;

    And the error:
    Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 67108864 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 40961 bytes) in my_custom_widget_functions.php on line 809

    I’m running WP 3.0 with the most recent version of your plugin. I have Make MCW-Tags Available and Apply Filter/Tag on Widget activated with “the_content”.

    Reply
29. ps perkins

    24 Jul ’10 at 10:23

    Having a strange issue. I have two wordpresses set up side by side on one domain. One is /preview/ and the other is /members/.

    They both use MCW plugin. It is working fine in /preview/ but in /members/ when I save a widget (exact copy of working widget in /preview/) and reload the “?page=my_custom_widget_functions.php” page, the widget and corresponding database entry is blank. I cannot get the widget to save. It writes to the classes.php file but the code is getting stripped out of the widgets in the database.

    Just bizarre to me that it works on one side but not the other. Any ideas?

    Reply
30. Mike

    27 Jul ’10 at 07:18

    This widget is what I was looking for but in WP3.0 in network activated mode the widgets seem to get forgotten. I add them, test the pages and they are there. I come back later and the mycustom widgets are no longer available as widgets and have disappeared from my sidebar.

    Reply
31. Janek

    27 Jul ’10 at 09:05

    @Myles: The way how WordPress handles widgets changed after WP 2.7.1. If your other widgets cannot be used on multiple sidebars this means that the corresponding plugins are not up to date (I would recommend to search for an update or contact the developer and ask him to add the multiple-sidebar-feature).
    The dropdown I was talking about should appear underneath each CustomWidget within /wp-admin/themes.php?page=my_custom_widget_functions.php. (The copy feature does not work with all widgets and has not been maintained since WP 2.7.1)

    @Jenn: Sounds like a problem with your webserver. The plugin tried to allocate 40961 of the allowed 67108864 bytes (equals 0.06% of the capacity). You could try to increase the allowed memory size. Does this problem only occur when you use this coding?

    
$recent = new WP_Query("p=32");
while($recent->have_posts()) : $recent->the_post();
the_title();
endwhile;


    I do not get a message like that. So I cannot reproduce the error.

    @Mike and PSPerkins: Looks like you 2 are facing the same problem. I never tested the plugin on a multiblog installation. But looks like I have to take a closer look. Unfortunately I do not know (yet) when I will have time to do that.
    If you guys find a solution for the problem, just send me a mail and I will add it to the coding.

    Reply
32. Lauri

    28 Jul ’10 at 02:28

    Problem can’t seem to figure out the reason.

    If MCW is active this works (both work if MCW id deactive):

    the_tags();
    the_content();

    this does not:

    the_content();
    the_tags();

    … any ideas?

    Reply
33. Bob Hendren

    11 Aug ’10 at 12:39

    If I’m trying to use PHP within a widget, how do I use a WP function and assign its output to a variable? I’m trying to do something like:

    $footerNav = wp_nav_menu();
    echo $footerNav;

    But it seems to be processing the wp_nav_menu() call right away, not outputting its contents to the $footerNav variable. I could also be calling it incorrectly, as it’s been a LONG time since I flexed my PHP brain.

    Reply
34. Janek

    11 Aug ’10 at 13:21

    Hi Bob.
    Please take a look at the function reference of wp_nav_menu(). You will see that this function does not return any value but displays the navigation menu directly as you already found out.
    You could try to use something like:

    
ob_start();
  wp_nav_menu();
  $output = ob_get_contents();
  // do whatever you want to do with the output
ob_end_clean();
echo $output;


    Hope this helps…

    Reply
35. Bob Hendren

    12 Aug ’10 at 09:38

    Thank you very much! That did end up working for me. Slowly getting some PHP back…

    Reply
36. tom

    17 Aug ’10 at 17:39

    love what your widget does. im a bit of a rookie and am having some issue with how to do what i am looking for. i need to have a different widget for 6 different pages on my site in the main side bar. i need to place in each widget a different vimeo album. can you advise me on the basic steps to set this up? i would be happy to make a donation for your product and additionally for your assistance.

    thank you in advance for any help

    Reply
37. Pat Perkins

    5 Nov ’10 at 15:08

    Been using your great widgets on a number of sites for a long time and I am grateful for all the work you put into building and maintaining this plugin (even though it makes me lazier than I should be at times when I should register a custom widget of my own I sometimes opt to use your plugin instead).

    Anyways, I was wondering if the backups that are created when you backup all widgets at once are stored with some kind of unique identifier in wp_options table that I could safely delete them?

    What I am getting at is that I’d like to clear them from the “inactive widgets” bar as I have made 3 backups by clicking the button and now my inactive widgets bar has 3 versions of each mcw widget for some reason unknown to me at this time.

    It looks like when I click backup, it creates a new inactive widget each time. Any idea why this is happening, or how to “dump” them properly if possible? Do I have to click each one and manually delete it in my widgets screen (ugh) ?

    Thanks so much for your time.

    Reply
38. Pat Perkins

    5 Nov ’10 at 15:16

    BTW – my previous issue was resolved – the widgets not saving. It was so simple it was a “doh” moment: I resintalled wordpress from the admin screen and it fixed it. Apparently a previous install had gotten interrupted or buggered in some way. Thinking maybe it was load.php but can’t remember specifically. The re–install fixed my issue.

    Reply
39. DavidM

    10 Dec ’10 at 20:46

    This thing is just awesome. I’m using it for widget development at my new blog and while any PHP/HTML enabler would work, this thing has these cool, little quirks that make it so much more fun. Excellent work.

    Reply
40. Jorge

    21 Feb ’11 at 15:59

    hi!,

    I’m getting this error in one of the two nodes I have WP serving same site trough load balancing.

    PHP Parse error: syntax error, unexpected $end in /var/www/html/wp-content/plugins/mycustomwidget/my_custom_widget_functions.php(811) : eval()’d code on line 70
    –

    Both servers are the same. same OS, same httpd, same php, same DocumentRoot files.
    Both use same DB backend.

    I tried what said under “Whole site crashes because of error in my_custom_widget_classes.php”, but no success.

    Thanks in advance for any help …

    Reply
41. Nathan

    6 Apr ’11 at 13:44

    For some reason, all of the buttons stopped working on the actual interface, so I can’t add new widgets or save anything. The pencil icon still opens the editing form but save does not work, it JUST started happening what do i do!

    Reply
42. Lisa

    4 May ’11 at 11:27

    When I click the edit icon (pencil) on the Edit My Custom Widgets page, no editor opens. This is on WP 3.1.0. I have only just inherited administration of the site, so I do not know what version it was originally installed on. I’ve tried it on Chrome and Firefox both.

    Reply
43. Lisa

    4 May ’11 at 11:35

    Sorry, it’s version 2.0.3 on WP 3.1.1 that I have installed.

    Reply
44. Lisa

    5 May ’11 at 04:22

    Update to 2.0.5 fixed it!

    Reply
45. Kerry Kaniewski

    16 Jul ’11 at 14:06

    Hello would you mind letting me know which webhost you’re working with? I’ve loaded your blog in 3 completely different browsers and I must say this blog loads a lot faster then most. Can you suggest a good hosting provider at a honest price? Thanks a lot, I appreciate it!

    Reply
46. AndyO

    24 Jul ’11 at 18:31

    Found a bit of a problem for multisite WP configs. Only one domain/site under a domain mapped multisite config can use MCW. (Using the current version 2.0.5 of MCW.) Whichever domain has last edited a widget is the only one custom widgets will work for. Those widgets will show up on the widget list of the other domains, and any widgets they had become unavailable. I tried setting up all widgets on a “master” site, but they won’t work on the others.

    Thanks!

    Reply
47. Kasey

    5 Nov ’11 at 02:08

    I just wanted to let you know this plug in has been a life saver for me. Being able to just code my own widget has saved me so much time and grief looking through the millions of plugins. Thank you so very very much.

    Reply
48. Tom

    6 Dec ’11 at 05:49

    Hi, I love your plugin. Especially because I can assign other widget to pages as well.
    Stupid thing is: I forgot how it works . I use to show a login plugin. Now I want to use a slideshow widget, but don’t know how. How can I get the exact code? I don’t remember how I came up with .

    Reply
49. Online Calculator

    8 Dec ’11 at 19:52

    Excellent weblog right here! Also your website so much up fast! What host are you the use of? Can I get your affiliate hyperlink in your host? I want my website loaded up as fast as yours lol.

    Reply
50. Dominik

    20 Dec ’11 at 08:41

    Hey there. I have a strange problem with your plugin in combination with the latest WordPress release (3.3) in multisite mode:

    Every once in a while when I’m in the admin backend and have MyCustomWidget enabled it throws me back into the admin area of the multisite “network site” (i.e. Blog# 1). The problem seems to effect the links in the admin bar.

    My solution – so far – is to go to the plugins selection and disable MyCustomWidgets. Then I have to click any link in the admin area and then I can reenable the plugin without any further problems (for some time).

    Are you still actively developing the plugin?

    Reply