How-To: Create a separate about page
Many of our templates provide a Text Area for your about information, and you can select this component when creating your own template, or add it in yourself if you have an advanced template.
The How-To looks somewhat long, but we've tried to be as detailed as possible. As always, if you have any questions, use the support ticket system and let us know!
Step 1: First we'll create the template for the about page. A template is applied to a page and determines the 'look-and-feel' for the page, so you are creating a template to assign to your About page and making sure it looks the way you want it to look.
1. Go to 'Templates' and 'Add A Basic Template'.
2. Click on 'Create Template'.
3. Name the template About (it's easy to reference that way) and then follow the steps in creating your About template - select the colours, fonts etc. that you'd like. If you need more information on each step using the Template Wizard, see our help files here: Creating a Basic Template
A Note on Components: For a basic template, you can have components on this page as well if you wish, but these will have to be separate from your main blog page. For instance selecting the 'Recently Added' component will not show the recently added from your main blog page.
For an advanced template, you can set the IDs for the various components to display components from your main blog page. For instance, you can set the Recently Added component on your About page to show the Recently Added items from your main blog page (index.html).
4. Now that you have saved your About template you should see it listed under Templates > Basic . Next to it you will see an option to 'Convert to Advanced'. Click on this and then 'Convert to Advanced' again (which is just to confirm the change). Now your About template will be under Templates > Advanced.
5. Click on 'Edit'. And then 'Next'. You will see the HTML/CSS for your site in three windows: Template HTML, Entry HTML and Comments Stylesheet. We are going to edit the content within Entry HTML.
6. Delete this line:
<strong><entry_time></strong><br />
(since you don't need the date the entry was posted for an about page, and it may look a little odd)
then, delete the following lines:
Posted By: <entry_posted_by> |
<a href='<entry_comment_link>'>Comment</a> (<entry_comment_number>)<br />
<entry_galleries><br />
<a href='<entry_permalink>' target='_top'>Permalink</a>
(these are again tags that make sense for a photoblog entry, but not really for an about page)
Click 'Save'.
Voila, your template is ready to go - the hardest part is over! It may seem complicated and a little difficult, but once you do it, you'll see how easy it is. Now remember, this template can also be used for other pages like a Contact page, General Info page, etc.
Step 2: Now that you have the template ready, we need to create the actual About page.
1. With your account you get 3 blog pages. You will need to use one of these blog pages as your new About page. Go to 'Pages' and click 'Add'.
2a. Name your new page about.html (it can be whatever you want, other than index.html, but about.html makes sense). For Blog name, type 'About' or 'YourBlogName > About' (such as Apparently Nothing > About).
2b.Select the template you just created in step 1 named About. (For future reference, if you create another blog page called Contact for example, and you want it to have the same look-and-feel as your about page, you will just need to create a new page and select the About template - easy-peasy!).
2c. Select 'Page is Private'. This will mean that this new about page will not show on the Expressions front page, or any future directory. Click on 'Next'. You can just click on 'Next' on the following page and then 'Finish'. Don't worry about making any selections on those two pages.
And, your page is all set to go. Now you need to create an entry with all your 'about' information.
Step 3: Creating your post for your about page.
1. Click on 'Pages' and then 'Add Entry' next to your new blog page called About.
2. Type up your about info in the Body section as you would a normal post. Include a photo if you want! (Please be sure to select a gallery for the post although there won't be a gallery listing for it, the system does require a gallery to be selected). Click on 'Add'. Now when you view your About blog page, you'll see your entry. It's all set!
The very last thing we need to do is add a link from your main blog page to your new About page. This can be done in a variety of ways and depends on whether your template is advanced or basic, and what components you have.
If you have a Links component, you can just add it to that. If you have a Text Area component you can also add a link there. Be sure to use the full URL (for example: http://youraccount.my-expressions.com/about.html). If you are in advanced mode, just edit your template and add your link wherever you want!