The code tag only changes the font so that your code appears different from the rest of your text. It does not fix it so that WordPress won’t recognize your code. To handle this in a very efficient way, use the service at htmlizer.

Just copy and paste your code fragments into the provided box and hit the “htmlize!” button. The code characters like <, >, " will be replaced with their HTML special characters so that the code is not perceived by the WordPress engine as actual code.

First, you have to tell WordPress that there are two sidebars for your theme. This step is called registering the sidebar. The important point here is to make sure that each sidebar is given a different name. Here, two sidebars are designated. They will have the names sidebar 1 and sidebar 2. Put this code in functions.php.

<?php
if (function_exists("register_sidebars")) {
register_sidebars(2, array("name" => "sidebar %d"));
}
?>

Alternatively, the functions.php code could use separate lines, one for each sidebar, like so:

<?php
if ( function_exists(‘register_sidebar’) )
register_sidebar(sidebar-one);
register_sidebar(sidebar-two);
?>

You could have more than one sidebar. Just make sure each one is registered with a new name.

The content for each sidebar will be in separate files, such as sidebar1.php and sidebar2.php.

Second, each sidebar must be included in the index, page, or single pages where each sidebar is to appear. Use a template path in an include statement with the name of each sidebar file, like so:

<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH . ‘/sidebar1.php’); ?>
<?php include (TEMPLATEPATH . ‘/sidebar2.php’); ?>

Third, the sidebar.php files must pass the name of the sidebar when calling the dynamic_sidebar function. At the top of each sidebar.php file, insert this code:

<?php if ( !function_exists(‘dynamic_sidebar’) || !dynamic_sidebar(‘sidebar 1′) ) : ?>

Here, we pass the name of the sidebar (sidebar 1), not the filename (sidebar1.php).

The top of the sidebar1.php file is:

<div class="sidebar">
<ul>
<?php if ( !function_exists(‘dynamic_sidebar’) || !dynamic_sidebar(‘sidebar 1′) ) : ?>

followed by a few list-items, closing unordered list and closing div tags. Sidebar2.php is as follows in its entirety:

<div class="sidebar2">
<ul>
<?php if ( !function_exists(‘dynamic_sidebar’) || !dynamic_sidebar(‘sidebar 2′) ) : ?>
<?php endif; ?>
</ul>
</div>

There you have it! Now all there is to do is to go back to the WP admin panel > appearance > widgets and select the widgets that you need for each sidebar. Now, your WordPress theme has two sidebars!

1. Removed search box from header. Actually did not remove the code, but commented out the lines for the search form in header.php.
2. Used widgets to create new content for both sidebars. Added a couple of text boxes to hold adsense codes.
3. Added a plugin for the archives page to work. Archives-index page did not work out-of-the-box and required the plugin called SRG Clean Archives. Downloaded Clean Archives 4.2 because I’ve updated to the latest WordPress (version 2.3.2). Uploaded the “srg_clean_archives” folder to the plugins folder and activated it.

That’s all for now. So, who else has made changes to this great theme?

Special link for updating WordPress.

Take each step in turn and make sure to backup everything and you’ll be ok.

After you update your blog to the most recent version of WordPress, why not try a new theme? The theme viewer over at WordPress has grown to include a wide selection of themes. All searchable by color scheme, number of columns, fixed width or fluid width, widget-ready, and so on!