Political Spectrum Bar

A WordPress plugin that adds a horizontal Liberal ↔ Conservative spectrum bar — arrows on each end, a positioned marker ball, and a filled pointer triangle below the ball. Build bars on a dedicated admin page and drop them into posts, pages, or widgets with a shortcode.

Installation

1. Download political-spectrum-bar.zip.
2. In WordPress admin, go to Plugins → Add New → Upload Plugin.
3. Select the zip, install, and activate.

Creating a bar

1. In the admin sidebar, click Spectrum Bars (the new menu with a left-right arrow icon).
2. Click Add New Bar.
3. Give it a title (for your own reference — not displayed on the front end).
4. Configure:
   • Position — use the slider or type a number from 0–100 (decimals allowed).
   • Left label / Right label — defaults to "Liberal" / "Conservative".
   • Marker label — optional text that appears under the pointer triangle (e.g. "You are here" or a candidate name).
   • Bar colors — use a blue→red gradient by default, or toggle it off for a solid color.
   • Colors for arrows, end labels, marker ball (fill + border), and pointer triangle.
   • Show numeric scale — optional 0 / 25 / 50 / 75 / 100 marks below the bar.
5. Click Publish (or Update).
6. Copy the shortcode from the sidebar meta box.

Using the shortcode

Paste the shortcode into any post, page, widget, or template where shortcodes are processed:

[spectrum_bar id="123"]

Inline overrides

Any saved setting can be overridden per-instance without editing the bar. Great for embedding the same bar in multiple places with different positions or labels.

[spectrum_bar id="123" position="72" pointer_label="Senator X"]
[spectrum_bar id="123" position="15" bar_gradient="0" bar_color="#333"]
[spectrum_bar id="123" left_label="Dove" right_label="Hawk" show_scale="1"]

Available attributes:

Features

• Custom post type — manage multiple bars from one admin screen; list view shows each bar's position and shortcode
• Live preview — rendered in the editor so you can see changes on save
• Shared stylesheet — admin preview matches the front-end exactly
• Responsive — adapts down to small phones (scales marker, bar height, and fonts)
• Accessible — marker has an aria-label announcing its position percentage
• Fully self-contained — no JavaScript required on the front end, no external dependencies
• Clean uninstall-safe — uses standard WordPress meta fields; removing the plugin doesn't leave orphaned custom tables

License

GPL v2