Create Dropdown menu for Labels widget

A labels widget displays your post labels. Each label is linked to a page containing posts which fall under that label. Usually as your posts increases, so will your labels. If you don’t limit them, sooner or later your labels widget will take over your sidebar :)

Regain control of your sidebar, shrink the widget -by converting it into a dropdown (or is it a pulldown?) menu. Your labels widget size will be reduced to just one line! And only expand into a full list when you click it.

Before applying this hack, you must already have a Label widget installed. If you don’t have one, go to Design > Page Elements and add it.

Now let’s make the dropdown:

1. Go to Dashboard > Design > Edit HTML.
2. Back up your template.
3. Make sure you DO NOT tick the  Expand Widget Templates checkbox.
4. Look for the following lines in your HTML code:

   <b:widget id='Label1' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'/>

5. Replace that line with this code:

   <b:widget id='Label1' locked='false' title='Labels' type='Label'> 
   <b:includable id='main'> 
   <b:if cond='data:title'> 
   <h2><data:title/></h2> 
   </b:if> 
   <div class='widget-content'> 
   <select style='width:100%' onchange='location=this.options[this.selectedIndex].value;'> 
   <option>Click to choose a label</option> 
   <b:loop values='data:labels' var='label'> 
   <option expr:value='data:label.url'><data:label.name/> 
   (<data:label.count/>) 
   </option> 
   </b:loop> 
   </select> 
   <b:include name='quickedit'/> 
   </div> 
   </b:includable> 
   </b:widget>

   • Change the width of the dropdown menu bay changing 100% to any percentage, or pixel (px).
   • You can change “Click to choose a label” phrase in line 8 to your preferred phrase.
   • Code line 11 is for post count, if you do not want to show post count at the end of each label, delete this line.
6. Preview before saving.
7. Congratulations you have shrunk your labels widget and created more space. You can now add more widgets! Oh no, you don’t! :)
8. Enjoy!