3 ways to sticky a post without buying a theme
A list of relatively low difficulty hacks for that vaunted sticky post. (Recommend basic coding skills before attempting ① and ③)
① Tags and jQuery
Download and use the Purely theme, or use its method as outlined here.
Strengths
Simply tag posts you want to sticky/feature
Easily customizable with some coding knowledge
Can have as many or as few featured/sticky posts as you want
Automatic once you set it up
Shows up on every page (non-infinite scroll browsing)
Limitations
The post will show up twice while browsing. (You might not want this for a single sticky post.) Workaround this using CSS to hide the non-stickied post (good luck) or change the post date to the distant past. In the latter case, at least the double won’t show up until the very end.
② Future post date
To edit the post date, click on the gear in the top-right corner when editing a post.
Strengths
No double posts. Shows up as your first post only.
No coding
Limitations
Future post dates don’t save permanently. A new post or reblog resets the post date, and you’ll have to wade through your posts to find it and change the date again manually. (Post date doesn’t affect the order of posts in your posts dashboard.)
Best thing to do is change the date after you’ve finished posting or reblogging, but that wouldn’t work with queues or scheduled posts.
③ Code it straight in your theme
Mix and match the strengths above. The only limitations are coding ability, time, and patience if you have to update your sticky post often. (Navigating to Edit HTML/Code takes so damn long...)
④ Bonus! Run an API call
Not exactly low difficulty (at least in my case), but here it is. Uses tags like the jQuery solution, except info is retrieved from an API call.
Happy coding!
