I’m technically illiterate so need some help understanding this.

On the bbPress pages, I am using CSS to hide sidebar…something like

.bbp-forum #primary {

display: none;

}

My question is: Is the sidebar is still loaded (on server, in browser) and just not displayed, or do I by simply styling it out of view also save some time on page loading?

[@jaredatch Member 12 years, 8 months ago]

No its definitely still being rendered by the server and the browser, your browser just hides it. Ideally you’ll want to find a way to nuke the sidebar on bbPress pages, but you’ll have to poke around your theme to do that.

[@martin_style Member 12 years, 8 months ago]

If you using method that, you have to load all information in one page, once time load slow, but not loading multiple times

[@sooskriszta Participant 12 years, 8 months ago]

Thanks guys!

@martin_style: Not quite sure what you mean by “once time load slow, but not loading multiple times”

@jaredatch: How do I nuke the sidebar?

I lied. I am not using

.bbp-forum #primary {

display: none;

}

I am using a plugin that replaces primary sidebar with a bbpress specific sidebar.

But I have 2 sidebars, and I am hiding the 2nd sidebar with CSS

.bbp-forum #secondary {

display: none;

}

So this is the one that I need to remove.

I am guessing that instead of fiddling with the Theme, it might be easier to patch the plugin. Here’s what it does at the moment:

function vp_sidebars_widgets($data)

{

// if bbpress enabled and main sidebar requested

if ($this->is_bbp && $this->is_main_sidebar)

{

// switch sidebar if bbrepss sidebar has some widgets in it

if (!empty($data[$this->sidebar_id]))

{

if (isset($data['sidebar-1']))

{

// uses sidebar-1 as main sidebar in most themes

// set forum sidebar as main sidebar

$main_sidebar_key = 'sidebar-1';

}

else

{

// get first sidebar which should be main in most themes

foreach ($data as $k => $v)

{

if (strpos($k,'inactive')===false)

{

$main_sidebar_key = $k;

break;

}

}

}



// replace main sidebar with bbpress sidebar

if (isset($main_sidebar_key))

{

$data[$main_sidebar_key] = $data[$this->sidebar_id];

}

}



// reset main sidebar request

$this->is_main_sidebar = false;

}



// return modified widgets array

return $data;

}

[@jaredatch Member 12 years, 8 months ago]

It depends on what theme you are using.

Theme’s typically call and register sidebar’s differently, which is why it is easier to fix this on a theme level and not a plugin.

Find out how your theme is handling sidebars, write mini plugin or block in your functions.php that addresses the issue.

We’ve been down this road already