Sidebar.php & WP Formatting

It might be because this isn’t right, or it’s the way you posted it. There should be quote marks around each attribute like this:

marginheight="0" width="160" height="600" border="0"...

Using it without quotes worked in HTML, but XHTML is much more picky, and that might be the problem. It might be something else, but give that a try.

As far as I can tell, Lorelle’s solution should work. You’ll need to add quotation marks around all of the values for all of your attributes, especially the src attribute, as a browser may read the space as part of the URI, or bork some way like that.

WordPress doesn’t fiddle with the code you insert directly into the template files at all. The only code that it touches is that which you enter into entries or Pages created through the Page feature. WordPress will parse PHP template tags included in the template files, but that shouldn’t effect your code at all. Make sure though that all the PHP tags around the area you’re editing are closed. That means for ever <?php you see, you should see a corresponding ?>. Your problem might possibly be that there’s an open PHP tag somewhere that’s stopping the browser from seeing your HTML code.

Thanks for the replies. I’d tried the iframe code before with the quotes, I removed to see if it would make a difference, sorry for the confusion. I enclose the contents of my sidebar.php file below. I’ve tested to see if it’s a browser cache issue or similar by adding “Testing” around the iframe tags, when I do this the word “testing” shows up, but when you view source there is no sign of the iframe at all!?!

<div id="sidebar">
<iframe src="https://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=easymentalism-20&o=1&p=14&l=st1&mode=electronics&search=Mp3%20Player&fc1=&=1&lc1=&lt1=&f=ifr&bg1=&f=ifr" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" width="160" height="600" border="0" frameborder="0" style="border:none;" scrolling="no"></iframe>

• <?php include (TEMPLATEPATH . '/searchform.php'); ?>

<!-- Author information is disabled per default. Uncomment and fill in your details if you want to use it.

• <h2><?php _e('Author'); ?></h2>
  A little something about you, the author. Nothing lengthy, just an overview.

-->

• <?php /* If this is a category archive */ if (is_category()) { ?>
  You are currently browsing the archives for the <?php single_cat_title(''); ?> category.

  <?php /* If this is a yearly archive */ } elseif (is_day()) { ?>
  You are currently browsing the "><?php echo bloginfo('name'); ?> weblog archives
  for the day <?php the_time('l, F jS, Y'); ?>.

  <?php /* If this is a monthly archive */ } elseif (is_month()) { ?>
  You are currently browsing the "><?php echo bloginfo('name'); ?> weblog archives
  for <?php the_time('F, Y'); ?>.

  <?php /* If this is a yearly archive */ } elseif (is_year()) { ?>
  You are currently browsing the "><?php echo bloginfo('name'); ?> weblog archives
  for the year <?php the_time('Y'); ?>.

  <?php /* If this is a monthly archive */ } elseif (is_search()) { ?>
  You have searched the "><?php echo bloginfo('name'); ?> weblog archives
  for '<?php echo wp_specialchars($s); ?>'. If you are unable to find anything in these search results, you can try one of these links.

  <?php /* If this is a monthly archive */ } elseif (isset($_GET['paged']) && !empty($_GET['paged'])) { ?>
  You are currently browsing the "><?php echo bloginfo('name'); ?> weblog archives.

  <?php } ?>

<?php wp_list_pages('title_li=<h2>' . __('Pages') . '</h2>' ); ?>

• <h2><?php _e('Archives'); ?></h2>

<?php wp_get_archives('type=monthly'); ?>

• <h2><?php _e('Categories'); ?></h2>

<?php list_cats(0, '', 'name', 'asc', '', 1, 0, 1, 1, 1, 1, 0,'','','','','') ?>

<?php /* If this is the frontpage */ if ( is_home() || is_page() ) { ?>

• <h2><?php _e('Links'); ?></h2>

<?php get_linksbyname('Links', '
• ', '

', '
', FALSE, 'name', TRUE); ?>

• <h2><?php _e('Meta'); ?></h2>

<?php wp_register(); ?>
• <?php wp_loginout(); ?>
• "><?php _e('Valid XHTML'); ?>
• XFN
• ">WordPress

<?php wp_meta(); ?>

<?php } ?>

<?php witty(); ?>
</div>

Anybody got any ideas on this? Can anyone test this is their install or test site?

I’ve tried the iframe without the closing iframe tag which someone suggested.

Just to clarify, when I add the above iframe code to my sidebar.php and upload it. I view in my browser, view source and where the iframe tag should be there is NOTHING.

thanks

Whoa! Too much information. The only part of your sidebar we are interested in was the part you already posted before. The whole thing, in this case, isn’t your problem.

Amazon changed their code not long ago and I had to go through and change all of my amazon ads, which was really frustrating. Log into Amazon and make sure that you have the most recent version of the iframe info that you want to post. That might be your problem.

If you have the latest version, did you do a total refresh of your browser? Clear the cache? For MSIE: hold SHIFT and click the REFRESH button. For FF: Cntrl+SHIFT+R

To make sure that everything is “okay”, put the following in your style.css file:

iframe {border:red solid 1px; padding:5px; background: green; }

If you upload the stylesheet and then refresh the screen, do you see a red bordered and green backgrounded box sitting where the iframe should be? Then you know that the iframe is “there” but the information inside isn’t. That’s when you leave here and go ask the folks at Amazon why it isn’t working.

Be sure to get rid of the iframe style when you finally get it work…hee hee.

Thanks for the reply.

I’ve tried completly clearing my cache to no avail.

The problem isn’t style based. The actual html for the iframe dissapears when it wordpress pulls the template files together to produce a page. There is no iframe tag in the wordpress generated html for any stylesheet to affect.

For example I edit sidebar.php on my pc, upload it via ftp. I can check via the “view” function on my ftp client that the file has correctly uploaded and the iframe code exists.

When I view the index of my site, no iframe is displayed AND when I view the source of the page there is no iframe code, just a blank line where it *should* be.

For the record, i’ve got the latest amazon code, but either way I should be able to write in whatever I like and WP not remove it when a page is generated.

I’m really confused as to what is causing this. It must sound like I’m talking rubbish but I’ve got pretty good experience of working with templates in various scripts and I’ve never come across anything like this issue.

BTW: I’m using the 1.51 beta version that is on the downloads page.

I have the same problem as you, mikejeffs.

The difference I have between mikejeffs is that I’m using a different feed (from thinkgeek.com, my wishlist) and similarly displaying it in an iframe. I CAN get it to work successfully to some extend, by calling my html file with the iframe.

I have the problem that it doesn’t display with the correct formatting as the rest of the sidebar (which I’m not sure how to fix) so I copy and paste the command that mikejeffs uses:

<div id=”sidebar”>

just before calling his iframe (thinking it’d be worth a pot luck shot, as I really have no idea!) and blow and behold it makes the iframe disappear completely!

So basically mikejeffs, I suggest you try getting rid of the command above, and see what happens. I’d say it’ll make your iframe appear, although it will probably screw up your formatting. I think?

I tried your stylesheet code to try and see if the iframe was rendering at all and it is not. There is no border around where the content should be. Has anyone gotten the amazon iframes to work? This would be an integral part of our site.