Oddthinking

If your blog is over a year or two old, you may have noticed the list of archive pages is getting unwieldy.
This plugin is a widget that compresses the size of the arcgives list to two lines per year (three if the lines are narrow) rather than one line per per month.
<h3>More information</h3>
This widget is licensed under <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html" rel="nofollow ugc">GPLv3</a>.
Grateful thanks to <a href="http://tech.windsofstorm.net" rel="nofollow ugc">Alan Morgan</a> whose widget_archives2 I used as a template.
Potential developers should check out the <a href="http://www.somethinkodd.com/oddthinking/2007/03/29/more-theme-changes-2/" rel="nofollow ugc">development history</a>.
Finally, an obligatory plug for my blog, <a href="http://somethinkodd.com/oddthinking" rel="nofollow ugc">OddThinking</a>.

Compact Monthly Archive

Show a monthly archive list in a compact format - one letter per month.

webvitaly

<ul>
<li><a href="http://web-profile.net/wordpress/plugins/" title="WordPress Pro plugins" rel="nofollow ugc">WordPress Pro plugins</a></li>
<li><a href="http://web-profile.net/wordpress/plugins/extra-shortcodes/" title="Extra Shortcodes" rel="nofollow ugc">Extra Shortcodes</a></li>
<li><a href="http://web-profile.net/donate/" title="Donate" rel="nofollow ugc">Donate</a></li>
<li><a href="https://github.com/webvitalii/extra-shortcodes" title="Fork" rel="nofollow ugc">GitHub</a></li>
</ul>
<h4>Shortcodes:</h4>
<ul>
<li><code>[extra_archives]</code> – list of monthly archives links sorted by date;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="yearly"]</code> – list of yearly archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="monthly"]</code> – list of monthly archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="weekly"]</code> – list of weekly archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="daily"]</code> – list of daily archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="postbypost"]</code> – list of all posts links sorted by date;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="alpha"]</code> – list of all posts links sorted by title;</li>
<li><code>[extra_taxonomies]</code> – list of categories, tags or any other taxonomies;</li>
<li><code>[bloginfo show="name"]</code> – <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/get_bloginfo" rel="nofollow ugc">bloginfo params</a>;</li>
<li><code>[date format="l jS \\of F Y h:i:s A"]</code> – Monday 23rd April 2012 09:37:57 AM; <a href="http://php.net/manual/en/function.date.php" rel="nofollow ugc">php date format params</a>;</li>
<li><code>[date format="l jS \\of F Y h:i:s A" timestamp="+2 years +3 months -20 days -10 hours +30 minutes"]</code> – Thursday 3rd July 2014 06:52:57 AM; <a href="http://www.php.net/manual/en/datetime.formats.relative.php" rel="nofollow ugc">relative datetime formats</a>;</li>
<li><code>[date format="h:i:s A" use_wordpress_timezone="1"]</code> – use WordPress timezone from Settings section;</li>
<li><code>[date_i18n format="l jS \\of F Y h:i:s A" timestamp="+2 years +3 months -20 days -10 hours +30 minutes"]</code> – Четвер, 3 Липня 2014 06:52:57; shortcode based on <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/date_i18n" rel="nofollow ugc">date_i18n</a>;</li>
<li><code>[time format="h:i:s A"]</code> – 01:35:08 PM; <a href="http://php.net/manual/en/function.date.php" rel="nofollow ugc">php time format params</a>;</li>
<li><code>[year]</code> – 2012, <code>[year plus="3"]</code> – 2015, <code>[year minus="2"]</code> – 2010;</li>
<li><code>[month]</code> – 4 (in April), <code>[month plus="10"]</code> – 2, <code>[month minus="8"]</code> – 8;</li>
<li><code>[month_name]</code> – April, <code>[month_name plus="10"]</code> – February, <code>[month_name minus="8"]</code> – August;</li>
<li><code>[day]</code> – 8, <code>[day plus="3"]</code> – 11, <code>[day minus="2"]</code> – 6;</li>
<li><code>[weekday]</code> – Monday, <code>[weekday plus="5"]</code> – Saturday, <code>[weekday minus="5"]</code> – Wednesday;</li>
<li><code>[hours]</code>, <code>[minutes]</code>, <code>[seconds]</code>;</li>
</ul>
<a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/extra-shortcodes/other_notes/" title="Extra Shortcodes" rel="ugc">more info about shortcodes</a>
<h4>Useful:</h4>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/page-list/" title="list of pages with shortcodes" rel="ugc">“Page-list” – show list of pages with shortcodes</a></li>
<li><a href="https://wordpress.org/plugins/iframe/" title="embed content" rel="ugc">“Iframe” – embed content</a></li>
<li><a href="http://web-profile.net/wordpress/plugins/" title="WordPress Pro plugins" rel="nofollow ugc">WordPress Pro plugins</a></li>
</ul>
<h4>Parameters for [extra_archives]:</h4>
<ul>
<li><code>[extra_archives]</code> – list of monthly archives links sorted by date;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="yearly"]</code> – list of yearly archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="monthly"]</code> – list of monthly archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="weekly"]</code> – list of weekly archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="daily"]</code> – list of daily archives links;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="postbypost"]</code> – list of all posts links sorted by date;</li>
<li><code>[extra_archives type="alpha"]</code> – list of all posts links sorted by title;</li>
<li>limit – how many links to be included in the list: <code>[extra_archives limit="10"]</code>; by default all links are shown: <code>[extra_archives limit=""]</code>;</li>
<li>show_post_count – display counter of posts in the archive: <code>[extra_archives show_post_count="1"]</code>; by default counter is not shown: <code>[extra_archives show_post_count="0"]</code>;</li>
<li>order – how to sort archives links: <code>[extra_archives order="ASC"]</code>; by default links are sorted by descending order (Z-A): <code>[extra_archives order="DESC"]</code>;</li>
</ul>
[extra_archives] is based on <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/wp_get_archives" rel="nofollow ugc">wp_get_archives function</a>.
<h4>Parameters for [extra_taxonomies]:</h4>
<ul>
<li>orderby – sort list by specific field: <code>[extra_taxonomies order="count"]</code>; by default list is sorted by name: <code>[extra_taxonomies order="name"]</code>; possible values: ID, name, slug, count, term_group;</li>
<li>order – the sort order of the list of pages (either ascending or descending): <code>[extra_taxonomies order="DESC"]</code>; by default: <code>[extra_taxonomies order="ASC"]</code>; possible values: ASC, DESC;</li>
<li>show_count – display counter of posts in the list: <code>[extra_taxonomies show_count="1"]</code>; by default counter is not shown: <code>[extra_taxonomies show_count="0"]</code>;* limit – how many links to be included in the list: <code>[extra_archives limit="10"]</code>; by default all links are shown: <code>[extra_archives limit=""]</code>;</li>
<li>hide_empty – show or hide empty categories or taxonomies: <code>[extra_taxonomies hide_empty="0"]</code>; by default empty categories are hidden: <code>[extra_taxonomies hide_empty="1"]</code>;</li>
<li>use_desc_for_title – use description for title: <code>[extra_taxonomies use_desc_for_title="0"]</code>; by default the description is used as link title: <code>[extra_taxonomies use_desc_for_title="1"]</code>;</li>
<li>child_of – only display categories that are children of the category identified by this parameter: <code>[extra_taxonomies child_of="77"]</code>;</li>
<li>exclude – exclude one or more categories (comma-separated list of category ids) from the results: <code>[extra_taxonomies exclude="5,7,9"]</code>;</li>
<li>exclude_tree – exclude category-tree (comma-separated list of category ids) from the results: <code>[extra_taxonomies exclude_tree="5,7,9"]</code>; The parameter include must be empty. If the hierarchical parameter is true, then use exclude instead of exclude_tree.</li>
<li>include – only include the categories detailed in a comma-separated list by category id: <code>[extra_taxonomies include="5,7,9"]</code>;</li>
<li>hierarchical – list is hierarchical (tree-like) or flat: <code>[extra_taxonomies hierarchical="0"]</code>; by default the list is hierarchical: <code>[extra_taxonomies hierarchical="1"]</code>;</li>
<li>number – sets the number of categories to display: <code>[extra_taxonomies number="10"]</code>; by default the number is unlimited: <code>[extra_taxonomies number=""]</code>;</li>
<li>depth – how many levels in the hierarchy of pages are to be included in the list: <code>[extra_taxonomies depth="3"]</code>; by default the depth is unlimited: <code>[extra_taxonomies depth="0"]</code>;</li>
<li>taxonomy – show list of registered taxonomy: <code>[extra_taxonomies taxonomy="post_tag"]</code>; by default shows the list of categories: <code>[extra_taxonomies taxonomy="category"]</code>;</li>
</ul>
[extra_taxonomies] is based on <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Template_Tags/wp_list_categories" rel="nofollow ugc">wp_list_categories function</a>.
<h4>Parameters for [bloginfo]:</h4>
<ul>
<li><code>[bloginfo show="name"]</code> – <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/get_bloginfo" rel="nofollow ugc">bloginfo params</a>;</li>
<li><code>[site_name]</code> – Name of the site;</li>
<li><code>[site_desc]</code> – Description of the site;</li>
<li><code>[site_url]</code> – http://site.url;</li>
<li>
<code>[wp_version]</code> – 4.5 (WordPress version);
[bloginfo] is based on <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/bloginfo" rel="nofollow ugc">bloginfo function</a>.
</li>
</ul>
<h4>Parameters for [date]:</h4>
<ul>
<li><code>[date format="l jS \\of F Y h:i:s A"]</code> – Monday 23rd April 2012 09:37:57 AM; <a href="http://php.net/manual/en/function.date.php" rel="nofollow ugc">php date format params</a>;</li>
<li><code>[date format="l jS \\of F Y h:i:s A" timestamp="+2 years +3 months -20 days -10 hours +30 minutes"]</code> – Thursday 3rd July 2014 06:52:57 AM; <a href="http://www.php.net/manual/en/datetime.formats.relative.php" rel="nofollow ugc">relative datetime formats</a>;</li>
<li><code>[date format="h:i:s A" use_wordpress_timezone="1"]</code> – use WordPress timezone from Settings section;</li>
<li><code>[date_i18n format="l jS \\of F Y h:i:s A" timestamp="+2 years +3 months -20 days -10 hours +30 minutes"]</code> – Четвер, 3 Липня 2014 06:52:57; shortcode based on <a href="https://codex.wordpress.org/Function_Reference/date_i18n" rel="nofollow ugc">date_i18n</a>;</li>
<li><code>[time format="h:i:s A"]</code> – 01:35:08 PM; <a href="http://php.net/manual/en/function.date.php" rel="nofollow ugc">php time format params</a>;</li>
<li><code>[year]</code> – 2012, <code>[year plus="3"]</code> – 2015, <code>[year minus="2"]</code> – 2010;</li>
<li><code>[month]</code> – 4 (in April), <code>[month plus="10"]</code> – 2, <code>[month minus="8"]</code> – 8;</li>
<li><code>[month_name]</code> – April, <code>[month_name plus="10"]</code> – February, <code>[month_name minus="8"]</code> – August;</li>
<li><code>[day]</code> – 8, <code>[day plus="3"]</code> – 11, <code>[day minus="2"]</code> – 6;</li>
<li><code>[weekday]</code> – Monday, <code>[weekday plus="5"]</code> – Saturday, <code>[weekday minus="5"]</code> – Wednesday;</li>
<li><code>[hours]</code>, <code>[minutes]</code>, <code>[seconds]</code>;</li>
</ul>

Extra Shortcodes

[extra_archives], [extra_taxonomies], [bloginfo show="name"], [date format="l jS \of F Y"], [date_i18n], [time]

Compact Monthly Archive vs Extra Shortcodes