ProPhoto - Premium Wordpress Theme for Professional Photographers - Single Column, big pictures - Blog Template

Nicole just left a comment asking how to adjust the font-size for her comments area.  I thought that was a very good question, and one I’ve been asked a few times, so I’m writing it up here for everyone’s benefit.

There are two places you may want to change the font-size in your comments area.  The first is in the area that lists how many comments and has the “show comments” and “add a comment” text, as shown below:

The second area, is the actual comments themselves, show below:

To change the font size in these areas, open up your Stylesheet in your Theme editor by going to “Design” => “Theme Editor” after loggin into your WP Admin area.  Once you’re in your Theme editor, from the right-hand side choose to edit the file called “Stylesheet (style.css)”.

Scroll all the way to the bottom, put your cursor at the end of the line and press return a few times to get on a new line.  Then paste in this chunk of code:

/* font size for comments area */
.meta-inner {
font-size:13px;
}

Adjust the number 13 to whatever size font you want.  This will affect both of the areas I discussed above.  If you’re OK with both areas having the same font size, you’re all set.  Just view your blog (remember to force your browser to refresh so you can see your changes) and check your work.

If you want the font size for your actual comments (picture 2 above) to be different from the other area (picture 1 above), you’ll need to add another chunk of code, like so:

/* font size for only comments */
.meta-inner #comments {
font-size:12px;
}

Again, adjust the number 12 to whatever you want, save the changes, view your blog and refresh your browser to check your work.

Related posts:
Change comment text color,
Display comments by default,
Comments aren’t working

Dennis recently commented on a post asking how to change the comment text color on main page comments.

Here’s how:

In you WordPress admin area, go to “Design” => “Theme Editor” and select “Stylesheet (style.css)” to edit it. Scroll down to lines 121-123 which look like this:

body.home #comments {
background-color: #E3E3E3; /* bg color of mainpage commment area */
}

Add a line inside the curly braces, like so…

body.home #comments {
background-color: #E3E3E3; /* bg color of mainpage commment area */
color:#ff990; /* color of comment text */
}

…except use the six-digit color code of your choice. Click “update file” to save your changes, then view your blog (remember to force your browser to refresh) to check your work.

I get lots of emails that basically say this:  my comments aren’t working, people can’t leave comments unless they visit the single-page permalink for the post.  If you’re having this problem, your comment area probably looks like this:

You can see how many comments there are, but there are no links to add a comment or show comments, just a lonely pipe line-thingy floating out in the breeze.

Fixing this is super simple.  It is caused by skipping a step in the installation.  This is what happens when you forget to activate and tweak the Ajaxed-Wordpress plugin which allows for the inline comments on the main pages.

To fix it, go back to this section of the tutorials, watch the video and carefully follow the instructions and your comments will work just fine.

Q: Can I make it so that the comments are displayed as the default?

A: Yes. In your WordPress admin area, go to “Design (’Presentation’ in WP 2.3 and earlier)” –> “AWP Managment.” Then click on “comments.” Look for a checkbox that says: Have “Comments open by default on index page?” Click it on and save your changes by scrolling down and clicking save.

Then, in your “Theme Editor” open the file called “Main Index Template” (index.php). Look for these lines of code:

<?php do_action('awp_comments'); ?>
<?php do_action('awp_comments_link');?> |
<?php do_action('awp_commentform'); ?>
<?php do_action('awp_commentform_link');?>

Delete the second line and rearrange the order of the lines so it looks like this:

<?php do_action('awp_commentform_link');?>
<?php do_action('awp_comments'); ?>
<?php do_action('awp_commentform'); ?>

Save your changes.

Q: How can I cut down on comment spam?

A: There are several ways you can cut down on spam. First, you can make sure that comment moderation is activated under “Options” –> “Discussion” in your WP Admin panel. Also, there are a lot of free plugins that you can download for WordPress that help cut down on spam. One of these, Aksimet, is automatically included in your wordpress installation. Just go to “Plugins” and activate it.

You will need a WordPress API key, but the plugin page will tell you how to get one. Basically, you have to sign up for a free “wordpress.com” account (like you were going to get a free blog there) to get an API key.  Just go to http://www.wordpress.com/ and establish an account by setting up a dummy free blog there, and they will email you your API key.