Opencart v1.4.0 has been released and is available to download here.

First off lets review the store front. This continues to improve and has definitely done so with this new release, it is probably now the prettiest cart out of the box! For those without the skills or time to change the template it offers a good look to simply start selling…it hardly needs any setting up and is simply thebest option for any online selling noobs out there. It does however give a wealth of functionality and flexibility for the more expert user but i digress. Being a ‘designer’ (perhaps not a very good one) the overall look is a bit young and cartoony for me, I dont like all the little icons and never have, these are easy to get rid of if you want to however. On the plus side the new drop down boxes for currency and language are cool and a nice improvement. Overall its very neat and tidy; a great platform to sell from.

OK lets review the admin side (user: demo password: demo). This is the area that has seen the most change. It now spans your screen instead of being fixed width and has a much more professional look. The menu bar is very nice with its see through dropdown list although it sometime does take a few mouse hovers to get the dropdown to actually drop (I noticed this in previous versions too and may be an Internet Explorer thing). The functionality has been improved and my quick whiz through the admin screens shows me a higher level of control to the administrator and the improved layout makes it so much easier and intuitive to work with. The admin really is a marked improvement from the previous version and as usual has great out of the box functionality, with Google Base, Sitemap and Talk all ready to blast off! Oh yeh and there is a neat new advanced search feature, plus the initial search allows users to search via category…..awesome!!

Code and database wise Im not sure what has changed as yet, I havent had a chance to delve that deeply, however as far as Ive seen people have upgraded and reuploaded their database without any problems.

I think Opencart is fantastic and will be huge like Magento (eventually). The one area that has to be improved upon to capture more users is the upgrade/module system. If there could be a more Wordpress-like automatic upgrade of core files, database and modules that would just be incredible and Im sure Opencart would take over the world and become a leader in its field! For now though Im just happy to be a small part of it and shall contribute anyway I can. As should you, if you download this free software why not contribute something to the cause, donate some money, write a review, link to the site and moan at your host to setup an auto install feature for Opencart.

Please let me know what you think of the new Opencart v1.4.0 below:

Once you start messing about with Wordpress and looking to expand it to fit your websites requirements you will undoubtably want to use different headers, sidebars, footers and even comment templates.

Its actually really easy to do in Wordpress and because you will be utilising files that should already exist in your template, it doesnt take long at all.

I guess most people will want to change the sidebar first, implementing new menus i.e. floating it left or right to create different page styles etc, so I will focus on sidebars but applying the principles will work for every template file mentioned above.

OK lets get started.

First create a new template file called called ’sidebar2.php’ or similar and open ‘the original ’sidebar.php’. Copy the code from sidebar.php and paste it into sidebar2.php. Now you have a new sidebar! Obviously you will want to make changes to the structure using CSS etc but I will leave that up to you.

Now that we have the new sidebar2.php file how to we get Wordpress to display it? Just replace this line:

with this one:

You would use this line to include all your new files i.e.

or

However getting the new comment template to display is slightly different. You must replace this line:

with this one:

Well there you have it, you can now create as many different template files as you want and implement them on your Wordpress site. Sweet!

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I realise this is a very simple thing to achieve in Wordpress and has probably been written about a thousand times, however I thought about what a great tool it is in Wordpress’s arsenal and surprisingly not used on too many sites Ive seen.

Aside from being able to use page templates to create different page designs they are very useful when using Wordpress plugins such as NextGen Gallery and SimplePress Forum.

These two plugins benefit greatly from using a full width page template i.e. no sidebar. So I will not go into the full intricacies of page templates and their many uses and implementations. Instead I will just show a simple example of how to create a full width page template with no sidebar. Ideally used for galleries and forums.

First of all open the directory containing all your Wordpress template files, normally found here: your-root/wp-content/themes/your-theme-name/

Look for the file entitled ‘page.php’ open it in your favourite code editor. Next create a new file called ‘page_fullwidth.php’ or similar in the same folder as page.php.

Next copy all the code from page.php and paste it into page_fullwidth.php, you can now close page.php as you no longer need it.

You must tell Wordpress that this file is a page template, to do this we must add the following code right at the top of the code:

You can call the template whatever you want, instead of ‘Page Full Width’ you could use ‘Forum’ or ‘Gallery’. This is the name that will be displayed (and can be set) in the ‘Attributes’ section on the right hand side under ‘Template’ in the add/edit page screen.

OK, now you are ready to make the changes to the structure of the page. In this case we want to remove the sidebar. so look for the following line and remove it:

Now you have to add some CSS. Namely adding divs that are the correct width for the new page. SO your CSS will probably have a container for the content called ‘container’ or ‘contentwrapper’ etc and will probably look something like this:

#contentwrapper {
	float:left;
	width: 620px;
	margin: 0 0 15px 10px;
	padding: 0;
	text-align: left;
  }

Obviously the width is to small to allow content to flow right across your new page template so me must change it to match the width of the containg div (if your theme is full screen and all widths are in percentages dont worry about doing this, most are fixed width these days though). Anyway create a new contentwrapper just for this page template. It should look something like this:

#contentwrapper2 {
	float:left;
	width: 910px;
	margin: 0 10px 15px 10px;
	padding:0;
	text-align: left;
  }

Remember and change the div declaration name in your page_fullwidth.php:

so the page template uses the new CSS.

There you have it, a full width page template with no sidebar.

Check out my next tutorial and learn how to setup and implement multiple/different sidebars, footers, headers and comment templates.

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