Categories

What are Categories?

Think of Categories as your newspaper sections, such as News, Features, Sports, etc. They are used on your site to group similar content (e.g. stories) so that readers can easily find stories that interest them.  You can add as many categories and subcategories to your site as you want, and links to these categories can easily be added to your navigation menu.  You can also easily add categories to your homepage as widgets to any of the widget areas on your homepage or your non-homepage sidebar.  A story may be assigned to multiple categories.

Each category has an automatically generated category page that contains all of the stories assigned to that category. Click here to learn about our category templates and customization options.

Adding a Category

1. Click Story Categories under the Stories tab on the left navigation in the WordPress dashboard.
2. Complete the fields for your new category.  Use the Parent pull down menu to identify this category as main level navigation or a sub-menu item for another category.
3. Click the Add button.

Note:  A category will not show up in the navigation bar until you have manually added it to the navigation bar.

Adding a Category to a Navigation Menu as a new tab.

1. Click on Menus under the Appearance tab.
2. At the top of the page, above the left column, choose which menu you would like to add your category to, and click Select.
3. Locate the new category in the list of categories in the left column. (You will probably have to click on Categories and then click on View All.)  Select it, and click Add to Menu.
4. You can then drag and drop the new page to the appropriate place in your menu.
5. Click Save Menu.

Adding a Category to the Homepage with the SNO Story List Widget

1. Click on Widgets under the Appearance tab on the left navigation bar in the WordPress dashboard.
2. Open the Area on the right side of the page where you want the widget placed.
3. Drag and drop the SNO Story List widget into that area.
4. Be sure to select the Category you want shown in the first dropdown menu, determine other formatting options, and click Save.

Assigning your Story to a Category

You can assign a story to your new category in the Categories box on the right side of the story in edit mode. You may assign a story to multiple categories, but this will cause it to show up in multiple places on your homepage. If you choose to assign a story to multiple categories, you will have the option to choose a Primary Category in the dropdown menu that appears below. 

Deleting a Category

1. Click Story Categories in the Stories tab on the left navigation in the WordPress dashboard.
2. Hover your mouse over the category name you’d like to delete.
3. Click the Delete link that appears just below the category name.

   Note:  Deleting categories will not delete stories.  If you delete a category that has stories, all stories will remain assigned to other categories they are assigned to. Stories that are not assigned to a category, however, will remain without a category (e.g. Uncategorized).

Editing a Category

1. Click Story Categories in the Stories tab on the left navigation in the WordPress dashboard.
2. Hover your mouse over the category name you’d like to edit.
3. Click the Quick Edit link that appears just below the category name.
4. Edit the category details.
5. Click the Update Category button.

Category Page Templates

Category Pages are the automatically generated pages that you see when you click on a category from your navigation menu or on a category widget title. These pages show all the stories assigned to a particular category like News, Sports, Opinions, etc. SNO has three built-in template options for your category page display: Preview Tiles, List, and List with Sidebar. You can set your default template and individual category templates in Design Options -> Category Templates.

Learn more about our Category Templates and their customization options.