WordPress: Top Commentators Plugin Options
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Mostly everyone who has a WordPress blog has started using the Top Commentators Plugin. Unfortunately, this plugin doesn’t have a preferences page so you’ve to modify its options only using the Plugin Editor available at Plugins >> Plugin Editor.
Don’t worry, modifying the options for the Top Commentators plugin isn’t that tough using the editor. It’s really easy. Let me tell you what what options are available and how you can modify them. All of these are listed at PFAdvices.
- Make the top commentators list reset in a time interval
Look for the text “reset”. You can modify the text inside the quotes to anything like hourly, daily, weekly, yearly according to how often you want to reset the plugin. There’s an additional parameter you can use - that’s #. If you want to reset the commentators list every 10 days, you can use #10.
- Limit the number of people shown on the list
Check for “limit”. Limit the number of names you want to be shown using this option. For example, if you want only three people to be shown in the list, it should be like this: “limit” => 3.
- Filter a name from appearing in the list
You can use the “filter_users” option to prevent any name from appearing in the list. If you find anyone spamming around, you could use this. You could also prevent your own name from appearing in the list using this option. For instance, “filter_users” => “Shankar”, “Shankar Ganesh” will filter the two names Shankar and Shankar Ganesh from appearing in the list
- Filter a website URL from getting into the top commentators list
You can filter any website URL from the list using “filter_urls“. Note that this will not filter the names with the associated URLs.
- Display a message when no comments made
You can set a message to be displayed when nobody has started commenting yet using the “none_text” option. For example “none_text” => “No commentators yet” will display the same message under the heading ‘Top Commentators”
- Link or don’t link to the commentator’s website
Set the make_links option to 2 if you don’t want to link to the commentator’s website. By default the value is 1.
- Limit a name’s length
Using the name_limit option, you can limit the number of characters that’ll get displayed if you find your blog’s commentators names are too long.
- Name seperators
Set the HTML code that seperates each name from the other using the start_html and end_html options. By default, it’s <li> and </li>.
- Extra tip: Make the Top Commentators list appear only on the homepage
The top commentators list is usually displayed site-wide across all pages on your blog. You can make it appear only on the homepage by using this block of code:
<?php if ( is_home() ) { ?>
<?php if(function_exists(’ns_show_top_commentators’)) { ?>
<li>
<h2>Top Commentators</h2>
<ul><?php ns_show_top_commentators(); ?></ul>
</li>
<?php } ?>
<?php } ?>
Hope you found the post useful!
Popularity: 1% [?]
Cool. I will have to use these once I get my Wordpress blog. Thanks.
Cool, thanks for sharing. This will really help the beginners like me who don’t know PHP.
Thanks again for sharing.
[...] WordPress: Top Commentators Plugin Option by Shankar Ganesh [...]
one doubt. are you sure its “limit”=>3 to limit users to 3??
Just asking coz it means limit equal to or greater than 3. so doesn’t it mean minimum 3 rather than maximum 3?
Secondly in C/C++ its always written as >= i.e greater than/less than is always followed by ‘=” rather than the reverse, if u get what i mean. I am not sure abt PHP though…
Sorry i got the trick => is similar to ‘=’ . Forgive my ignorance
Thanks for the tips.. I am going to install the plugin sometime now.
Beta3: No problem
Manas: Fine, will you be installing the ’subscribe to comments’ plugin as well?
Good write-up. I think almost everyone is using this plug-in now
I’m glad you liked it, Kuanhoong. Yeah, everyone seems to use this plugin.
This is very useful. I did not know how to take my name out of the list
@ Shankar - Installed the plugin and the Subscribe to comments one as well.
This plugin is one of my favorites as it’s a great way to give recognition to your most active readers. The link love is great too lol.
Awesome post, this is a real good way to decipher what a software does for the end user.
Good post buddy, this is a useful plugin to increase comments.
@Manas: I’m glad you installed it.
@Brown Baron: You’re right.
@Simonne, Techie Buzz, Ram: Thanks, and I’m glad you enjoyed this post.
Nice tutorial. I’m using the top commentator widget, which is can be customized easily.
@Nirmal: Hmm… I should give the widget a try.
Very nice Shankar. Stumbled.
[...] Top Commentator Plugin option by Shankar Ganesh [...]
Nice post Shankar , i messed my page while trying these a while back , now it wont happen .
[...] Wordpress: Top Commentators Plugins Options by Shankar [...]
Gili: Thanks for the stumble.
Madhur: Thanks for dropping by!
wow great list! stumbled
Thanks for the stumble, Internet TV.
It would be really great if someone rewrite the plugin with a options page. because editing the plugin will make us loose the settings whenever new version is updated.
I second your suggestion, Benedict. An options page for the plugin would be great.
[...] to know is this plugin can only be modify through Plugin Editor but don’t worry because the important facts can be found on PFAdvice also. I hope you enjoyed reading this [...]
Good post buddy
which is a the best top commentator plugin..
@Shashank: As far as I know, there’s only one such plugin, available here.
how to auto approve comments with this plugin …
@shashank: Comment approval doesn’t depend upon this plugin. It just lists the top commentators. That’s its only function.
Hello, One thing that has been missing from this and PFAdvices is where to place the code. The instructions assume the default WP theme. I’m having a hard time figuring out where to put the code in a non-default theme. Any suggestions? Thanks.
I’m using the Cutline theme, but I can’t figure out where to put the code, either. When I add it to the sidebar.php file, it shows the headline only, but not the names or # of comments.
Step-by-step directions would be very helpful if you would be so kind as to post them!
hi nice post, i enjoyed it
Thanks, Cristina.
[...] WordPress: Top Commentators Plugin Option by Shankar Ganesh [...]
One thing that seems odd is that there are more comments just on this thread than are showing up. So do comments time out then?
[...] to leave a comment on your blog. If you want to tweak the comment a bit, have a look at this really nice tutorial by Shankar Ganesh. This plugin is a must-have if you want more comments for your [...]