[NOT INCLUDED IN SELECTED SKIN!] – Widgets not appearing in b2evolution

I finally got around to upgrading my b2evolution blog today from version 1.10 to the much improved 2.4. Version 2 of the b2evolution blog has seen a lot of improvement, and as such my upgrade from the previous version was not as simple as I had hoped. The main problem was that my custom skin needed to be completely rebuilt based around the new template. Whereas the main page template in 1.10 was called “_main.php” it’s not called “index.main.php”, and uses a whole new array structure to pull in various bits.

One fantastic addition is the inclusion of installable widgets that get automatically added to your blog once you install them in the back end. However, upon completing and installing my custom skin my admin are was telling me “[NOT INCLUDED IN SELECTED SKIN!]” next to my Sidebar, Sidebar 2, Header, Menu and Page Top sections. Sidebar is the only one I’m using, and I know that I’ve got it included on the page. The 2 widgets I already had installed were showing up fine, but trying to add new ones resulted in an error message and them not showing up on the front end.

The b2evolution forums and support were no help, but I finally ran into the solution after some random clicking about on things. If you go to Blog Settings > Skin > Manage Skin you will see a “Reload” icon next to each skin. Hit that for your custom skin and it will rescan your files and realise what areas are included on your page.

John Robinson - designer, developer, coder... John’s not quite sure exactly how he should be labelled. Why not check out his blog and make a decision for yourself. He mostly talks about CSS, jQuery and the crazy world of the Interwebs, with a little bit of personal life thrown in for good measure.