I wanted a “static front page” that (could be) different from the rest of the site, but also editable through WP. I tried using the Static Front Page plugin, but I couldn’t edit the template the way I wanted to (to make it different from the rest of the site). Here’s what I ended up doing:
Using Ami Heines Front Page Filter plugin, I created a new category (e.g. Home Page) and then created a post I’d want on the front page (e.g. Welcome). So far, so good, that post (and only posts in that category) would be on the front page. However, I wanted a different sidebar etc., so although I thought I’d be able to edit category-9.php, that home page really uses index.php, so I edited that the way I wanted it (including another sidebar e.g. sidebar-home.php that I custom made).
Then of course the rest of the site is going to use that same index.php file unless I’m sure there are other files to get there first. So I made sure there were (or created): single.php, archive.php, page.php, etc.
All working nice and pretty now at joequirk.com.
