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Pretty Sidebar Categories

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Pretty Sidebar Categories

by GrandSlambert

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Description

Display posts from selected taxonomies in your sidebars. Multiple formats including featured images are possible.

Features

  • Display posts from any term in a selected taxonomy in your sidebars.
  • Option to display posts in the same categories as the current post on single post pages.
  • Fully templated — add more templates in your own theme and select them in your widgets. Includes four templates.
  • Creates two new image sizes for use in widgets — set the sizes on the options screen.
  • Use the category title or write your own title, and optionally link the title to the category archive.
  • Optional Elementor widget (when Elementor is active) with matching content controls and Style tabs for title, items, dates, excerpts, and images.

Languages

This plugin includes German, French, Italian, and Spanish translation files.

  1. Upload pretty-sidebar-categories to the /wp-content/plugins/ directory, or install through Plugins Add New.
  2. Activate the plugin through the Plugins menu in WordPress.
  3. Add the widget to your sidebars under Appearance Widgets (or the Customizer / block widgets screen).
  1. Sample list format

    Sample list format

  2. Sample display with left aligned image, date, and excerpt.

    Sample display with left aligned image, date, and excerpt.

  3. Sample display with full width image, date, and excerpt.

    Sample display with full width image, date, and excerpt.

  4. The form for setting up your widgets.

    The form for setting up your widgets.

What post types does this plugin support?

By default, the plugin searches public post types. You can change which types are included on Settings Sidebar Categories.

Where can I get support?

Visit https://grandslambert.com for plugin information and support options.

1.3.0

  • Modernized for current WordPress (6.4+) and Plugin Check compatibility.
  • Added plugin header License, Requires PHP, and ABSPATH guards.
  • Escaped admin and front-end output; sanitized settings and widget updates.
  • Replaced deprecated PHP/WordPress APIs (create_function, old wp_count_terms args).
  • Removed remote CDN / contributor XML offloading from the settings screen.
  • Extracted shared front-end renderer used by both the classic widget and Elementor.
  • Added optional Elementor widget with content, query, and display controls matching the classic widget.
  • Added Elementor Style tabs for title, description, items, dates, excerpts, and images (typography, colors, hover, spacing, image border/shadow).
  • Added Title HTML Tag control (H1–H6, div, span, p) for the Elementor widget heading.
  • Hide the classic WordPress widget from the Elementor panel so the native Elementor widget (with Style tab) is used.
  • Fixed Elementor widget registration when Elementor loads before this plugin (so the native Style tab / Title HTML Tag widget appears instead of the WordPress wrapper).
  • Fixed Full Width Image template so featured images span the full widget width.
  • Excerpt more text always links to the post; removed the option to disable the link. More-link colors apply to that link.
  • Elementor: replaced the excerpt more separator text field with an Icons control (chevron-right by default), plus icon size/spacing style controls.
  • Updated Stable tag and Tested up to.

1.2

  • Fixed an issue with the widget form to allow selection of sort order.
  • Fixed an issue where category descriptions were not being used correctly.
  • Fixed a bug that failed to use the category name when the widget title was left blank.

1.1

  • Fixed taxonomy selector with multiple widgets.
  • Added sort order, match current post categories, and category description options.

1.0

  • First official non-beta release with custom post type selection.
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