FAlbum Recent Pictures in Side Bar

I recently got an e-mail requesting how I got the recent photos in my side bar on my The Masters Family blog. This was done with using the FAlbum WordPress Plug-in By Elijah Cornell. I really dig this plug-in and subsequently it is responsible for me having 3 separate Flickr accounts of which 2 are Pro accounts.

Let me start by saying I know why I got the e-mail. This plug-in can be a real bear to get going.

I will start with the basics of of getting the plug-in installed and then move on to the side bar.

FAlbum Installation –

• Download the plug-in from http://www.randombyte.net/
• Upload it to your plug-ins directory
• Login to you WordPress Blog
• Click on the Plug-ins tab
• Activate the FAlbum Plug-in
• Once activated click on the Options > FAlbum tab
• Click the link labeled – Step 1: Authorize FAlbum with access your Flickr account
• This will open a new browser window that will prompt you to enter your Flickr account info.
• Enter you Flickr username and password
• Close the Flickr window and return to your WordPress Admin Section window
• Click the button labeled Step 2: Get Authentication Token – After this clicked the Falbum options will appear below
• These are the options that you need to set –
• • Enable globally: True
  • Thumbnail Size – 75px x 75px
  • Display Drop Shadows: True
  • * Use Friendly URL’s: Title
  • * URL Root: /photos/
  • • * The 2 above are depended on how you have your permalink structure setup. See my post WordPress Permalink Post Names for SEO for more understanding of what this is.
• Click the “Update Options” button at the bottom.
• Click on Mange > Pages > Create new page
• For the page title type – Photos (this depends on you Permalink structure, see above note)
• Click the “Create new page link”
• Click on – View Site
• You should have a new page named “Photos”. click on the link and you should see you Flickr photo sets.

FAlbum Photos in Sidebar

• Open the sidebar.php file of your theme in a text editor.
• Place the following code where you would like the 4 most recent pictures to appear –
• <?php global $falbum; ?>
<h2><em>Recent Photos</em></h2>
<div><ul>
<?php echo $falbum->show_recent(4,1,'s');?>
</ul>
<a xhref="<?php echo $falbum->create_url("show/recent"); ?>" title="View all recent photos">Recent Photos</a>
</div>
• Save the file and upload it to the correct theme folder
• Note – you may need to adjust the formating depending on your theme. The above code uses the sidebar formatting for the Blix theme that is used in my The Masters Family and The Masters House web sites.

Final Notes – The above install instructions are for version 0.6.4 of the FAlbum plug-in. Also, you can download the Blix theme that I use on themastershouse.net site which includes the sidebar modifications.

• Blix Theme with Falbum Sidebar (fixed)

Technorati : Falbum, Flickr, Photo Album, WordPress, WordPress Photo Album, WordPress Plug-in