How to Set Up Gonzo WordPress Theme

Gonzo WordPress Theme is a very cool, colourful, energetic, responsive theme that suits very well with any entertainment, gaming, travel, artwork, food, or photo blogs. If you have lots of photos (or at least one image) in each blog post, Gonzo is indeed a great theme. But if you don’t, Gonzo will display a “no image” thumbnail on your post, I don’t see any on/off switch for thumbnail image display, so it doesn’t look too cool with all those “no image” thumbnails. Anyway, how does one setup a site like the Gonzo demo site?

Similar to setting up Modernize theme, first you need to create a page, name it “Home”. Edit the page, under Visual tab, you see some little Gonzo icons, the first one allows you to set the width of each module, the third one (looks like a m) allows you to select what kind of module you want to use. Assuming you want to display titles from all categories using module B, the shortcode is [loop category=all module=b ]. Now you go check your page, and you might ask where is that pretty image slider? The trick is that you need to select “Homepage” as your page’s Template, then you will get a slider which can display a maximum of 8 featured images. Also, you might want to remove the “Home” page title and save again. 🙂

Gonzo puts quite an emphasis on Category page setup, you can change colour, select background, add description, activate a featured slider, etc. There are two common problems that new users might encounter:

1. Your thumbnail images look a bit too oversized – If you have read the documentation, it can be easily fixed by running the “Regenerate Thumbnails” WordPress plugin.

2. The thumbnail images under the WordPress Popular Posts tab are way too big – Go to the widget area, under the “WordPress Popular Posts” setting, set width and height as 50 pixel.

gonzo_wordpress_theme_homepage_layout

01-17-13 How to setup Gonzo WordPress Theme Homepage? How to setup the homepage like the one presented in the Gonzo demo? Some friends are confused about the homepage setup, here I’m trying to write a bit more.

First, in “Pages”, “Add New”, name it “Home” or something, remove the page title. In “Page Attributes”, select “Homepage” as “Template”. In the demo image, the module A area has 2 main columns. If you like that, put the following code in your “Home” page. Save.

[loop category=all module=a ]
[loop category=all module=a ]

In WordPress Reading Settings, remember to set “Front page displays” as “A static page”, select “Home” as your “Front page”. Since you already removed the page title, you will only see a blank line in the pull down option, that’s your “Home” page. The above is just an example, if you want to show a specific category, replace “all” with your category slug, e.g. [loop category=some-blog-money module=a ].

If you want to use module B layout, simply put [loop category=category-name-01 module=b ] [loop category=category-name-02 module=b ] [loop category=category-name-03 module=b ] … in your “Home”.

If you want to use module C layout, put the followings in “Home”.

[loop category=abc module=c ]
[loop category=def module=c ]
[loop category=ghi module=c ]
[loop category=jkl module=c ]

Now you will see 4 little columns below your image slider.

When you “Edit Page”, under the “Visual” tab, there is an “Insert Columns” button. That is all up to you to decide how you want to play with the columns’ width. For example, you can try this:

[one_third][loop category=all module=c ][/one_third][two_third_last][loop category=all module=c ][/two_third_last]

If you leave some space on top of the above code, the contents will not align properly.

If you want to use Gallery Module, make sure you select your blog post’s format as “Gallery”, or they won’t show up in the Homepage.

06-05-13 If your image slider is not pulling images in your category page, like just showing a loading gif, make sure that 1. In that category setting page, check “Enable Featured Slider”, 2. In your blog post page, on the right hand side, set a “Feature Image”, 3. in your blog post page under “Single Post Options”, you have clicked “Featured Post?”. If you have done 1 and 2 but not 3, you will get that loading gif and no featured images showing.

62 thoughts on “How to Set Up Gonzo WordPress Theme

    1. Did you run the plugin “Regenerate Thumbnails”? The image slider will hold 8 of your latest featured images. If you select 8 featured images, 8 little dots will appear at the bottom right corner of your slider.
      pic1 pic2
      pic3 pic4
      pic5 pic6
      pic7 pic8
      pic1 is the featured image of your most recent post…

  1. Hi, pretty good article. I also got a newbie question for you. I purchased the gonzo theme yesterday and I just can’t find the documentation… would you mind sharing where I can find the documentation? Thanks in advance

      1. …Not any more.

        Current install apparently has a broken implementation of OptionTree, I cannot get this template activated without database errors – even after manually installing OptionTree myself.

        1. Are you using Gonzo 1.8.2? I have no problem with 1.8.2. You won’t get “update notification” in WordPress admin panel. In order to get notified of any updated version, you have to “check” “Get notified by email if this item is updated ” in the ThemeForest Downloads section.

          If you are using an old version and tried to activate it, you will receive a lot of database errors.

    1. It looks like “Regenerate Thumbnails” can only regenerate image thumbnail, maybe you need another plugin to generate thumbnail for video… sorry, not quite sure

  2. how can I loop the module A like the one presented at the demo? to make my category generate a number of posts on its bottom?

  3. Hello please help.. I wan’t to have a featured image on my category page but there is only a box to enable the feature slider. I have also tried a few other things in the categories template but it didn’t work.. All I have is one category that will have multiple posts and I just want there to be a featured image at the top. Also I was able to change the “Browsing “whatever” category” title at the top to display my company and category but what I really want here is to get rid of that and the divider line above it and have my featured image(graphic title)
    thanks so much really apppreciate any help

    1. Hi, are you saying that you want a featured slider on your category page? You need to have some posts in that category, and each post should have a featured image selected. According to the category template, there are only two choices, i.e. either the featured slider, or that “Browsing “whatever” category” title. If you don’t like that “Browsing “whatever” category” title line, I suppose you can delete or modify line 10 in category.php. Btw, I also tried that Category wysiwyg Editor thing, somehow it doesn’t seem to work.

  4. Hey man! Great post and thanks for a lot of the help. Everybody is struggling to make their Gonzo site look like the demo and its a pretty tough learning curve!

    Anyways, the main issue I’m facing right now is that the demo has multiple pages with specific categories into specific pages.

    Do you happen to know on going about this?

    For Ex., I want to create a second page that has the same style as the “Home Page”, which I can only do by creating a page as opposed to a post. I only want specific posts going to that page, like its my sports section and I want all my sports-related posts going to that SECOND home page. My primary home page would have all posts together, say music, sports, school etc.

    Been racking my head for a week so any help would be much appreciated!

    1. Thank you. You are welcome!

      Did you try “Edit Category”? You can make “your category page” looks like your “Home Page”, e.g. use a image slider, a different right sidebar, etc. For the post items layout, you can use Blog style 1, Blog style 2, or shortcodes.

      I tried the shortcodes method without success, e.g. posting an image. Somewhere in the code, the image path isn’t correct.

  5. Hello,

    I installed the theme, and I did the same as you said, but the flex slider in the hompage shows nothing, just a blank slider with a loading gif. how can I modify it and add the 8 featured images with the corresponding caption for every one.

    Thanx in advance..

  6. the site messes up when i use it on i pad or anything else then a computer … the sub menus dont aline up …. please help me 🙂

    1. You can check your site using a free trial of BrowserStack. You get 30 mins of free test time. Anyway, I checked your site a little bit on there. It looks like it’s working for iPhone 4 but not iPhone 5, and iPad 2 but not iPad 3. I have checked my Gonzo setup there as well, it works for both iPhone 5 and iPad 3.Maybe there is some conflict with your blog plugins?

  7. Wow nice work. I have one question. If iam adding this lines to my Home Site:

    [loop category=all module=a ]
    [loop category=all module=a ]

    The Navigation is showing only twice of the same news/category. But in you page and on the Demo-Page. It shows different artikels/categorys etc. pp.

    Second:

    How can i add the Facebook, followers and subcription menü on the navigation bar?

    thanks!

    1. Hi! You can try replace “all” with your other category slug name, then you can have different articles on different column. In “Theme Options”, “Footer Social Widget”, you can set your Facebook/Twitter URL?

  8. Thanks a lot. One question again! 😀 On the demo one u can pull over the Menubar and the colours are changing. On my site the colours dont start to change by overflow with the mouse. It only change colour if i jump to the specific category. How can i “fix” this issue?

    thanks!

    1. Documentation 2.4 got the answer. Go to Appearances > Menus and add the category to the menu. Then quickly take a look at that category in the category editor. Copy the colour value you gave it and paste it into the description field of the menu item. Make sure that there is no ‘#’ symbol.

      If you don’t see the “description field”, click “Screen Options” button at top right corner of the page, check “Description” in “Show advanced menu properties”.

  9. Hi,
    I have a problem with a slider, I would like to have instead of image short video, but when i upload it, i have to click on it and it open’s in another page to play. Is there any possibility to play it directly on homepage in slider?
    Thanks a lot.

    1. First, you need to make some posts with template “Gallery”

      Then use shortcode such as [loop category=category-name module=gallery ] in your “Home” page.

    1. Use those column shortcodes, e.g.

      [one_half][loop category=abc module=a ][loop category=def module=a ][/one_half]
      [one_half_last][loop category=ghi module=a ][loop category=jkl module=a ][/one_half_last]

  10. Hey, its me again^^

    I have one question about the articel style. Is it possible to write an article with more than one site? If the article is very long, i want that its split automaticly in more than one page.

    thnak a lot by the way for all of your help!

      1. I,ve spent about 4 hours trying to get page break to work and it really has me in a slump bro I’ve read through a few websites on the Gonzo page break issue but none of there resolves seem to work for me is there anyway i can get you to take a look at my website theme and give it a go, i tried months ago and gave up but once i started this morning i really want to fix this for some awesome post i have in mind

        1. How to split a WordPress post into multiple pages? By default, WordPress already supports page break. Manually, you can add anywhere in the blog post. Or you can install a free WordPress plugin like TinyMCE Advanced, an “Insert Page break” button will be added to your visual editor.

          How to add page break to Gonzo theme? Edit the file single.php, search “the_content();” after that, add “wp_link_pages();”. Now your page breaks should work with some pagination.

  11. hello, i have a problem with flex slider. The images of featured posts are not at the same size with slider. I’ve used regenerate thumbnails plugin but it’s not correct yet….Please help me…

  12. Thanks for this post – it’s come in very helpful a few times. Now that I have Gonzo set up, I’m wondering how to change the margins between the content on the homepage and the sidebar. There’s so little space that the text runs together.

    Cheers!

  13. Hey man,

    Firstly, thaks for the write-up and for responding to everyone’s concerns.
    I followed your instructions and love how my site is looking now junta.co.za, however:

    1. The articles in Module A are not acting as links, just static text. The problem occurs in Chrome but not IE.
    2. My gallery module doesn’t scrolle left or right in Chrome or IE, but in IE you can at least click into the gallery.

    Any idea why and how I can fix it?

    Thanks for your time

    1. Would that be a plugin conflict? Try to disable them and re-enable one by one… I checked your site, those problems do exist, but my site is fine. Or you can check Dome’s http://www.computerwiese.de, his articles in module A are working too…

  14. Thanks for your reply!

    I checked Dome’s site, works perfectly in all browsers. I’ll play around with my plugins and see what progress I can make.

    Thanks again!

  15. All working great, beautiful theme.. one question.

    On home page I am using [loop category=nameofcategory module=c ]

    no issues, it is doing what it should do, however I would like to REMOVE the small snippet of light grey text, and ONLY show the title of the post. Is this possible?

    Thanks in advance and if you are part of the coding team, then hats off.

    1. For example, if you are using module a

      Edit page loop-module-a.php, remove line 70:

      Or line 50 in loop-module-c.php for module c

      No, I’m not affiliated with them, just one of the Gonzo customers. 🙂

  16. I can’t seem to find a way to change the “Galleries” heading…the posts are displaying, but I have a heading that says “Galleries” and I really want to change it – any suggestions?

    1. Are you talking about your Homepage’s Gallery? Try edit loop-module-gallery.php, remove line 18, the line contains the word “Galleries”.

      1. Thanks, man! Worked like a charm!

        Is there any way to make multiple instances work on the homepage? So, I want one gallery for “sponsors” and another gallery for “events” – is this possible?

Leave a Reply to Spacemonkey Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.