Do you want to add author boxes to your WordPress website’s sidebar? Does your theme not support author boxes?
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Meks Smart Author Widget: Quick Review
The Meks Smart Author Widget enables users to display an author (or any other user role’s) information in a WordPress widget complete with an author bio and a link to the author’s archive.
I wrote a detailed review of the Meks Smart Author Widget plugin for Nimbus Themes that you should check out if you want to read a bit more about what you can do with it. And for those of you who want to dive right in, check out this quick tutorial where I show you how to configure the widget.
A Developer’s Perspective
As a developer, I think that the Meks Smart Author Widget plugin makes for an excellent addition to sites that use themes that don’t include author boxes right out of the … box. The widget itself is easy to configure and doesn’t create a separate settings page. You won’t even notice it’s there. (On the back-end, I mean).
Meks Smart Author Widget uses your theme’s styling so it’ll fit right in with your website’s design. In terms of functionality, I like how it includes everything you’d want to include in an author box and nothing extra. And even if you have a bunch of posts published on your site, Meks Smart Author Widget will automatically detect their authors and work smoothly.
Pros
- Lightweight, easy to configure.
- Integrates seamlessly with existing WordPress websites.
Cons
- No cons – unless your theme already has an author box.
An Average User’s Perspective
As an average user, I was surprised at how easy it was to set up the Meks Smart Author Widget. I have a few people contributing to my personal website and the plugin automatically detected each author and displayed their information on their posts which saved me a bunch of time.
It also let me configure the avatar’s size and limit the length of the author bios which is how I was able to give my website a consistent look throughout. What I liked best about this plugin was that it just fit right in with my website – no difficult settings to configure, no layout messing up.
Pros
- Fits right in with your existing site.
- Allows you to limit author bio/description length.
Cons
- None whatsoever!
To Sum It Up
So, should you use the Meks Smart Author Widget on your site?
As a developer, if your client is using a theme on their site that doesn’t come with an author box then I strongly recommend going with the Meks Smart Author Widget plugin.
And if you’re an average user that can’t figure out how to get your author profile to show up on your site, give the Meks Smart Author Widget a try.
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