Last week I explained how to set up your index.php file for your new template. This week I’ll cover the included files, ie. the header, footer and sidebar (if its needed as a separate file).

The Header

Your header needs to be in a file header.php. This is the file that the function get_header() will include, as explained last week. In the header file goes all the markup from the top of the design that needs to be on every page.

First we change the page title to be dynamic. I’ve written about how…

Say your theme only has one sidebar.php and you want to have a different sidebar on your index then on your archives page. Adding extra sidebars is surprisingly easy and this is how to do it.

First we’ll create the sidebars. You can copy your current sidebar file and rename it to something like sidebar_two or sidebar_archives, almost anything you want really. If you decide to create it from scratch and want to maintain the widgets functionality of your theme be sure to include “<?php if ( function_exists('dynamic_sidebar') && dynamic_sidebar(2) )…