Friday July 15, 2005
I just finished up a theme I have been working on a for a little while. It’s a 4-column theme called News Time. You can see it in action at Balanced News Blog or on The English Guy. It has 3 main columns where the posts get put and a sidebar to the right for search, last posts, archives, advertising and so on.
What’s a little different about it is that you can change how it’s laid out by changing just one variable in index.php. It can be laid out:-
- with posts going from left to right then repeating layer by layer,
- by category (three categories are needed at least),
- by equal number in each column filling left then middle then right in that order.
Update
News Time 1.1 is now out - what is different? There are some updates that I have chronicled in the CHANGELOG.txt that comes with the release, but here they are:
- comments are now clearer and more separated; comments appear in their own box, mouseover effect (in mozilla browsers)
- sidebar now shows categories
- featured post on the front page, shows the latest post in that category
- search is fully implemented with a search results page (search.php) and the search box in the sidebar
- added page.php so it handles pages just like singles
See this theme in action on The English Guy.
Installation
First, this theme requires WordPress 1.5+ Once you have downloaded the theme, unzip it and:
- Upload the unzipped theme to your
wp-content/themes/directory. - Enter your Admin panel -> Presentation and select the theme.
Frequently Asked Questions
None so far! It is a simple unzip, install and off you go. You can edit the theme as you wish (it IS commented a little bit). If you have any questions, you can comment here, or you can go over to the WordPress Forums where I started a News Time Theme thread.
Terms of Use
Except where otherwise noted, this software is:
- Copyright Richard Dows
- Licensed under the terms of the CC/GNU GPL
- Provided as is, with NO WARRANTY whatsoever
In a nutshell, the GPL means that:
- You may freely use the works for any purpose, including commercial ones
- You may freely make derivative works provided that you leave the proper attribution and copyright notices; this includes the copyright notice in the footer.php with appropriate link back
- You may freely distribute the works and derivative works provided that you make the source code readily available under the same terms
Documentation
There is a README.txt file included with the release which you should read so you know how to set it up.
Download
If you like this theme, or others, please consider making a donation.
Download the News Time Theme v 1.0
Download the News Time Theme v1.1










Trackbacks & Pingbacks • [feed]
Trackback 1
[...] e (now version 1.1) with several new features. You can find the full list of changes on my News Time page on my blog. This post should be in it’s own wide box at the very top of the page, in the [...]
Trackback from Richard’s Test Blog » Blog Archive » News Time Theme v1.1 on August 8, 2005
Trackback 2
[...] quick rundown of a few things that have happened in the past few days. I have updated the News Time theme (now at version 1.1); it has some updated sidebar options, a new “featured” post [...]
Trackback from The English Guy » Blog Archive » Quick Daily Items on August 9, 2005
Trackback 3
[...] na, schön verrückt, dieses News Time Theme, oder? Wo ich das her habe? Vom The English Guy >> Werde ich nicht gerade hier benutzen, aber gut zu wissen, daß man sowas auch mal hat [...]
Trackback from Basic Thinking Blog » Blog Archive » Wie gefällt Euch dieses News-Theme? on September 4, 2005
Trackback 4
[...] This theme is a continuation of News Time Theme. It is a four-column theme for WordPress called News Print. There are three columns where the content gets written, and an additional mandatory sidebar. [...]
Trackback from Brass Cupcakes » Blog Archive » tester on January 7, 2007
Trackback 5
[...] theme is a newer version of the News Time Theme. It is a four-column (or three-column, depending on what you set it as) theme for WordPress called [...]
Trackback from The English Guy :: News Print v2.0 Theme :: http://www.theenglishguy.co.uk on March 18, 2007
Comments • [feed]
Comment 1
Great looking theme. I’ll give it a try.
Any plans on making revisions or tweaks to it?
Ken Savage commented on July 24th, 2005
Comment 2 [ Administrator Reply ]
Yes I am. The theme is in use, and is going to be upgraded to make it a little finer. I will be posting version upgrades on here (as well as upgrading this site’s Pages).
rich commented on July 24th, 2005
Comment 3
Is there any way that I can force a break in the article so that I decide where the post will be truncated?
For some reason it is ignoring the WP tag, it would also be nice sometimes to be able to force a paragraph break in the excerpt that shows on the front page although that is not any sort of huge issue.
Thanks
M
stageleft commented on August 10th, 2005
Comment 4 [ Administrator Reply ]
Do you mean on the first page, where all the articles are displayed in columns?
Yes there is! But it requires a bit of post writing discipline. In the “excerpt” box, write what you want the column posts to show (i.e., not the full article). Then in the larger “post” box, just write your article. The columns will show the excerpt as the article, making visitors click on the article to read it in full.
rich commented on August 10th, 2005
Comment 5
heh — now I feel like a bit of a dolt, ya see, I always use w.blogger for creating posts… I can’t actually remember when I last used the default WP content entry panel so I didn’t even consider the excerpt box.
Thanks
M
stageleft commented on August 10th, 2005
Comment 6
Is there anyway to justify or align the text in the columns and in the post headings to the left instead of center? The theme is beautiful, but the blank spaces between words is a bit disconcerting and hard on the eyes…
Lynndal commented on August 23rd, 2005
Comment 7 [ Administrator Reply ]
Lynndal - yes!
In the stylesheet, just change the line 202 to `text-align:left;`.
rich commented on August 24th, 2005
Comment 8
How can we get notified about this theme if it’s updated?
Ken Savage commented on August 25th, 2005
Comment 9 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Ken!
Well one way would be to add my rss feed to an agreggator of your choice (the block of 6 buttons at the top of the column to the right). Any comments added to this thread would show up as new and you’d know. I tried to notify people when I did update it this time, but obviously I missed a few (sorry for that!).
I’m also looking for a newsletter plugin for the WP, so if I find it I’ll experiment with it. Other than that I think rss is best or just keep checking back.
BTW Ken - the updates that were put in were requested. So if you have ideas, just shout out. This theme (News Time) is also in working action at Balanced News Blog, albeit in version 1.0 rather than the updated version (which I plan to migrate it to soon).
Richard
rich commented on August 25th, 2005
Comment 10
I installed but I only get my articles in the left column. The center column is blank. What do I need to do to get post filling up the page. I tried changing the order=0 command to 2 but that didn’t help either.
JB commented on August 26th, 2005
Comment 11
Hi,
Today I downloaded and installed your theme News Time and I am very happy with it. I had no experience working with css-files, but I managed to change some things nevertheless.
I have a few questions: as a journalist I am trained that one never should put two headers in the same font next to each other. As you see on my site there are now even three headers of the same font next to each other. I would like to put something in the middle column on top (an illustration, a poll, anything that ‘breaks’ the line of three) but I whenever I add a new post this will be moved. Is there a way to anchor something at the top of the middle column, so that new posts are added below it?
Question 2 is: apparently the blog is centered on the page. Is there a way to let it move to the left?
Thanks for the effort.
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 26th, 2005
Comment 12 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi JB - welcome! Do you have an example running where it only shows the left-hand side? I’d like to take a look to see if I can help you.
Theo - welcome to you too.
1) Changing the middle column; go to index.php, line 129 (
<div id="middle">). After that, put your poll, illustration or whatever you want to break the flow up.2) Moving the blog to the left; offhand, I’d say open style.css, line 23 and change it to
margin:0;that should move it all to the left. I think.Richard
rich commented on August 26th, 2005
Comment 13
Thank you Richard. May I try another one: I would like to replace the header with a graphic, but although I see several references to a header in the css I cannot find a related file that I can replace with an image file.
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 29th, 2005
Comment 14 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Theo, welcome back. The #header refers to the div that holds the h1 title, and the menu. You -could- set the background graphic to be a jpg/gif but remember the navigation menu would appear on top of it.
rich commented on August 29th, 2005
Comment 15
Thanks again. I also find that the -tag doesnt work in News Time. I read the workaround, but do you have an explanation why it doesnt work?
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 16
Well solved it, one shopuld add a new tag to The Loop. See here: http://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags/the_content
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 17 [ Administrator Reply ]
Which tag, Theo?
rich commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 18
Ha, now I see it, I put something between “” and it disappears. I was referring to the more-tag. Apparently WP wants to see a line with “the_content” in the index.php (in the Loop-section) and then it works. In the News Time index.php there is no such line. I put it back in and I can now use the more tag. This would be a better solution then the one you gave to user stageleft on august 10.
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 19
Between the parenthese I expected to see the bigger than and smaller than signs as used in tags. I hoped that the parentheses would allow me to show those signes nevertheless, but apparently not.
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 20
Strange: I can now use the more-tag, in the regular posts, but the contents of the featured category are now partly copied to the top of the first column as well. And the featured box does not show the more-option. That is understandable since the “featured-code in index.php is not part of the loop but above it.
When I remove the line I added to the loop (the “the_ content”- line) everything is back to normal.
But would you have a solution? (Or do you think that I am abusing your blog now?)
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 21 [ Administrator Reply ]
Ok, first, you’re more than welcome to post questions about the theme, don’t worry about how many
WP expects the_content() in index.php yes. But, I moved all the posting code to the post-featured.php, post-left.php, post-right.php, and post-middle.php files. You can find it in the #post-middle div. If it’s on the front page (the
if(is_home())line) then it shows the_excerpt(), otherwise it shows the_content().The featured code is still part of the loop, just a special loop (
<?php $my_query = new WP_Query('category_name=featured&showposts=1'); ?>) that finds the featured category posts and displays only the latest one.rich commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 22
Right, so the only solution is to type in in separate excerpts and full texts. Did you do this to force your users to put short texts on the frontpage? Wouldnt it have been easier to leave the more-function intact and tell your users that they should use the more tage often to get the newspaper lay out. Or was there no ther way to get these 4 columns?
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 23 [ Administrator Reply ]
Theo - you can alter the code itself easily enough in the post-featured, post-left, post-right, post-middle. Admittedly, the theme was originally designed around Balanced News Blog, which had excerpts showing on the front page, so I never altered it. This was forced because often, writers forget about the “More…” tag (
<!--more-->), so I just chose to make it use the_excerpt() as default.What I’ll do is add the changes into version 1.2, so people can choose whether they have excerpts on the front, or the full content (With the “More…”).
rich commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 24
Wonderful, thank you!
TR
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 25
You are right it is easy enough to do it myself. I replaced the ‘if(is_home()) lines)’ etc in the separate php-files with ‘php the_content(’more’);’ (in the correct format of course) and it works. Thanks again.
Theo Richel commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 26 [ Administrator Reply ]
Glad you got it fixed Theo. I will however, try to make it optional if I can, like the settings are in the index.php
rich commented on August 30th, 2005
Comment 27
awesome theme. I have only one question. When I put something as “bold” when posting, it doesn’t show up bolded. Is there an easy solution to this? thanks
Manon commented on September 4th, 2005
Comment 28 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Manon and welcome!
Where are you putting it as bold? Are you using css to do so? Are you using <b> or <strong>? In the content, or the excerpt? Got a URL I can look at?
rich commented on September 4th, 2005
Comment 29
it’s just in the post page on WP. I am using the quicktags to make it
Manon commented on September 4th, 2005
Comment 30
oops
to make it (strong)
Manon commented on September 4th, 2005
Comment 31
Hi,
In News Time Each post ends with a line, but apparently the whole blog ends with a line over 3 columns as well. This last line ennoys me: how do I remove it or tell WPP to move with the text?
Thanks again
Theo Richel commented on September 5th, 2005
Comment 32 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Theo - yes I’m working on that. That in fact, is the only thing that bugs me about the theme. I will post any updates. This btw, only occurs in IE…
rich commented on September 5th, 2005
Comment 33
Hi Rich,
that bold thing isn’t an issue when the ONE post is focused on… so no sweat… but it’s just one of those things that puzzles me. Is there a way to add a “previous” or “next” entry at the very end of the page?? So far I can only go to entries not shown by using the calendar or the archive links.
Manon commented on September 5th, 2005
Comment 34 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi manon - I see what you mean, I’ll get that included in the next release.
rich commented on September 5th, 2005
Comment 35
Hi Rich,
I got rid of the 3-column wide line as described in nr 34. I edit my css-file with Fronpage and I changed the .post-bottom tag’s wrapping from none to left. Tah did the trick (although I do not know iof there are side effects. My styl;esheet now reads: border bottom: 1px solid #000000;; padding-left:0; padding-right:0; padding-top:0; padding-bottom:10px; float:left
Do you agree with this solution?
Theo Richel commented on September 7th, 2005
Comment 36 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Theo, yes that gets rid of the line (in IE) but I still think the underlying problem exists somewhere. I’m still looking for it though.
rich commented on September 8th, 2005
Comment 37
I’ve made room in the theme for a top banner, we all like them don’t we
Added the following into the css sheet
#banner {
background-image: url('my-banner.gif');
background-repeat: no-repeat;
background-position: center;
height: 80px;
width: 650px;
padding: 18px;
}
replaced
in the index file with
Obviously the banner width, height, and location values need to be adjusted to suit the banner used. I also had to adjust the value in #header in the css sheet to make room for everything.
There may be a better way but it works for me.
stageleft commented on September 8th, 2005
Comment 38
OI - the other code tags didn’t seem to work - can ya fix that for me?
stageleft commented on September 8th, 2005
Comment 39
I am also wondering how to display a full archive listing, for some reason only the first part of the month displays.
stageleft commented on September 8th, 2005
Comment 40
Is there any way of limiting the number of post by column? I would like to have just one post per column. Thanxs.
jd commented on September 13th, 2005
Comment 41 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hmm the code never came through stageleft, nor in edit either.
Jd, just change the $column_max to 1
rich commented on September 14th, 2005
Comment 42
Thanxs so much!
jd commented on September 14th, 2005
Comment 43
This is a really good wordpress theme.
I am using it on http://www.profitsguru/blog and I am currently trying to get it to do everything I want it to do. I will be checking back regularly for any updates.
Nice work, Richard.
Ray
Ray commented on September 17th, 2005
Comment 44
Ooops!
That should have been http://www.profitsguru.com/blog
Sorry,
Ray
Ray commented on September 17th, 2005
Comment 45 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Ray, glad you found a use for it! If you have suggestions or improvements you’d like to see, just shout it out. Version 1.2 is going to be out soon with a few fixes so if anyone has anything they need say so.
rich commented on September 17th, 2005
Comment 46
Hi Rich,
Just one or two little fixes.
The last post on my front page http://www.profitsguru/blog always has a second bold ‘number of comments’ link on the line underneath the first. I think stageleft.info displays the same problem (usinr IE).
A second problem, which happens intermittently, is that the text on the third column drops by about 2 - 4 lines - but only sometimes.
Not big problems but I’d like to know if they can be sorted.
Finally, when I tried to add your Yahoo RSS link to My Yahoo - so I could keep up to date with new verions of this theme, Yahoo says the link is broken.
Anyway, good luck with v 1.2.
Ray
Ray commented on September 18th, 2005
Comment 47 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hey Ray - I fixed the Yahoo thing, thank you.
rich commented on September 18th, 2005
Comment 48
Hello. I love this theme! Thanks for posting it. I have one question: is it possible to add thumbnail images to go with stories on the front page? Thanks
Ian
Ian commented on September 20th, 2005
Comment 49
Also, sorry to be a pain - but any guidance on how to customise the navbar along the top so it links to certain pages would be fantastic!
Ian commented on September 20th, 2005
Comment 50 [ Administrator Reply ]
Yes it is Ian. This approach is used at Balanced News Blog. You a div.post-info in post.php like this:
Float it to the right (float:right;clear:right;) and style as you wish.
rich commented on September 21st, 2005
Comment 51
So I just paste that code into post.php? Does it matter where?
Looking at the code (I’m not too familair with PHP, sorry) I can’t work out how the code knows which category your post is - or how it knows which thumbnail image to choose. I can see on your site that each category has its own different thumbnail. But in the code you posted, there doesn’t seem to be anything that says ‘if category is 5, then choose foobar.jpg’.
Am I being thick? Sorry to be a pain. I chucked you a small donation to say thanks for the theme and the help.
Ian commented on September 22nd, 2005
Comment 52 [ Administrator Reply ]
Hi Ian - put this code just beneath the
<div class="post">:The above code is for 3 categories, with the appropriately named 3 images. You can of course greatly increase this to encompass all the categories, with more images.
Remember to style this div, positioning, floating etc.,
Thanks for the donation, much appreciated.
rich commented on September 22nd, 2005
Comment 53
I still can’t get it to work! I pasted the code below the bit in post-left.php and uploaded some correctly named images to right directory, but nothing appears.
1) Do I have to do anything else to trigger it?
2) How do I ‘float’ it? What’s the code for that?
Thanks again - you’re ace.
Ian
Ian commented on September 22nd, 2005
Comment 54 [ Administrator Reply ]
To float it, do this:
rich commented on September 22nd, 2005
Comment 55
Sorry - so I’ve copied the long bit of code beneath the div class=”post” bit in post-left.php (and tweaked the URL of the images) but where abouts do I paste the float code exactly? And in which php file?
Ian commented on September 22nd, 2005
Comment 56 [ Administrator Reply ]
You paste that float code in the stylesheet (style.css).
richard commented on September 23rd, 2005
Comment 57
Doh - I still can’t get it to work. I must be doing something simple wrong
Could you take a look at my site? I’ll toss you another $20 as a gesture if you can make the thumbnails work!
Ian commented on September 28th, 2005
Comment 58 [ Administrator Reply ]
I’ll mail it to you Ian.
rich commented on October 1st, 2005
Comment 59
it was the greatest theme i ever seen. i’d like to thank you! just perfect job buddy. please try to make this greater.
king regards
serdar commented on October 12th, 2005
Comment 60 [ Administrator Reply ]
Serdar, thanks, you’re welcome
rich commented on October 12th, 2005
Comment 61
i’d like to ask you something. now 4 coulmns exist, is it possible to have top (extra) column only for 1 (recent or newest) post?i mean, there will be 1 top coulmn which shows 1 recent news and other columns (standart) will show rest of the news.
could you help me…
serdar commented on October 13th, 2005
Comment 62
Don’t suppose you’ve any idea how to add a second sidepanel? So you’ve got one on the left hand side of the screen, and one on the right?
Thanks
Ian
Ian Harris commented on October 20th, 2005
Comment 63
Hi,
I installed News Time theme, all I could say is wow! I have populated it with rss feeds, and have just installed some google adsense banners. Here comes the problem.
Looking at my page using Firefox is Fine, there is no problem. However, when I use MS Explorer, the columns move away from each other, and the top and bottom banner ads are cut off.
I’m not sure about other browsers (Opera, Safari, etc.) If I delete the banners, everything is fine in MS Explorer! Or if the banner is at the bottom, everything is fine in MS Explorer.
I’ve been moving the code for the top banner around, and no solution has been found.
Any suggestions would be helpful.
Thank you,
Gil
Gil commented on October 22nd, 2005
Comment 64
Richard - thanks so much for this lovely theme! I like it so much that I have modified it only minimally! I had posted this in the Wordpress support, but I guess you’ve stopped checking that (?).
I have a minor suggestion: Why don’t you include all the common stuff from index.php, post-single.php, category.php, page.php, searchform.php etc. into the header and footer files?
These lines can go into the header.php from:
to:
And these lines can go into the footer.php from:
to:
This will make things very convenient for making changes to the Navigation links or including stuff in the header!
Also, I think it would be nice to put the ‘Powered by Wordpress’ tag in the footer of the theme when you distribute it, although you need not put it on your site.
Sooraj commented on October 27th, 2005
Comment 65
still experimenting with this, but love the possibilities. for some reason i see the full text of my posts on the main page and it seems this version was coded to truncate posts on the main page. any ideas?
idio commented on November 5th, 2005
Comment 66
this is what i’ve looking for, good job richard and keep up the good work ;).
aPis commented on January 23rd, 2006
This blog requires you to login before replying. If you do not have an account you can create one (for free!).