Show/hide Widgets in Dashboard Based on Current Advanced Custom Fields Option

You’re in luck. I was actually looking for an excuse to do this on one of my projects. I finally took the time to add this idea into one of my themes. 🙂

You can take this idea and run with it. It’s very basic and bare-bones example, but it does what you want it do to.

This doesn’t cover theme options. This assumes you already have your
theme settings managed in some way (which it sounds like you do).

Step 1 – Tell WordPress about “Widget Areas” supported by your theme.

if ( ! function_exists( 'mbe_theme_register_widget_areas' ) ) {

    /**
     * This function tells WordPress that your theme supports up to 4 Widget Areas:
     * 1.) Header Column 1
     * 2.) Header Column 2
     * 3.) Header Column 3
     * 4.) Header Column 4
     *
     * Allows Widgets to be placed in various places within the theme header.
     *
     * @author Michael Ecklund
     * @author_url http://www.michaelbrentecklund.com/
     *
     * @return bool
     */
    function mbe_theme_register_widget_areas() {

        $widget_areas = array();

        $widget_areas[] = array(
            'name' => 'Header Column 1',
            'id'   => 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-1'
        );

        $widget_areas[] = array(
            'name' => 'Header Column 2',
            'id'   => 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-2'
        );

        $widget_areas[] = array(
            'name' => 'Header Column 3',
            'id'   => 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-3'
        );

        $widget_areas[] = array(
            'name' => 'Header Column 4',
            'id'   => 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-4'
        );

        foreach ( $widget_areas as $widget_area ) {

            $default_args = array(
                'before_widget' => '<div id="%1$s" class="widget mbe-theme-widget %2$s">',
                'after_widget'  => '</div><!-- end .mbe-theme-widget -->',
                'before_title'  => '<div class="mbe-theme-widget-title">',
                'after_title'   => '</div><!-- end .mbe-theme-widget-title -->'
            );

            $args = wp_parse_args( $widget_area, $default_args );

            register_sidebar( $args );

        }

        return true;

    }

    add_action( 'widgets_init', 'mbe_theme_register_widget_areas' );

}

The above code should be pasted in your currently active WordPress theme’s functions.php file.

Step 2 – Create the template files for each type of header.

In this example, you’ll want to create 4 new template files in the root directory of your currently active WordPress theme:

  1. header-column-1.php
  2. header-column-2.php
  3. header-column-3.php
  4. header-column-4.php

Step 3 – Make each new header template file widget ready.

In this example, I’ll demonstrate a 4 column header template (header-column-4.php):

<?php


# BoF Header Column 1
echo '<section class="col-lg-3">' . PHP_EOL;

if ( is_active_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-1' ) ) {

    // Display Widgets
    dynamic_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-1' );

} else {

    // No Widgets, display default fallback markup.
    echo 'Default Column #1' . PHP_EOL;

}

echo '</section><!-- end .col-lg-3 -->' . PHP_EOL;
# EoF Header Column 1


# BoF Header Column 2
echo '<section class="col-lg-3">' . PHP_EOL;

if ( is_active_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-2' ) ) {

    // Display Widgets
    dynamic_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-2' );

} else {

    // No Widgets, display default fallback markup.
    echo 'Default Column #2' . PHP_EOL;

}

echo '</section><!-- end .col-lg-3 -->' . PHP_EOL;
# EoF Header Column 2


# BoF Header Column 3
echo '<section class="col-lg-3">' . PHP_EOL;

if ( is_active_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-3' ) ) {

    // Display Widgets
    dynamic_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-3' );

} else {

    // No Widgets, display default fallback markup.
    echo 'Default Column #3' . PHP_EOL;

}
echo '</section><!-- end .col-lg-3 -->' . PHP_EOL;
# EoF Header Column 3


# BoF Header Column 4
echo '<section class="col-lg-3">' . PHP_EOL;

if ( is_active_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-4' ) ) {

    // Display Widgets
    dynamic_sidebar( 'mbe-theme-widget-area-header-column-4' );

} else {

    // No Widgets, display default fallback markup.
    echo 'Default Column #4' . PHP_EOL;

}

echo '</section><!-- end .col-lg-3 -->' . PHP_EOL;
# EoF Header Column 4


echo '<div class="clearfix"></div>' . PHP_EOL;

?>

Step 4 – Edit header.php in your currently active theme to activate dynamic header output.

<?php

echo '<section class="container">' . PHP_EOL;
echo '<section class="row">' . PHP_EOL;

$header_template = get_option( 'mbe-theme-header-template' ); // Retrieve theme option configured by user.

if ( ! $header_template ) {
    $header_template="column-3"; // Fallback: Set a default header template.
}

get_template_part( 'header', $header_template );// Load the header template.

echo '</section><!-- end .row -->' . PHP_EOL;
echo '</section><!-- end .container -->' . PHP_EOL;

?>

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