How to activate "custom fields" section in WP3

Question

This is probably a stupid question, but I am setting up a finnish Wordpress installation. The "custom fields" section in the "write post" section is gone; I gather it is hidden by default.

That is a great step, but my finnish is a bit rusty, it's my first WP install, and I can't for the life of me find the switch to turn it on.

Where do I do this?

Edit: Martin shows a way to do this on a per-post basis, thanks for that. In my case, it would be useful to always show custom fields, so extra brownie points for anybody who can give me a hint on how to do that. I can't find any documentation on this.

Answer 1

Per default some meta boxes are hidden. These boxes are stored in an array which you can find in wp-admin/includes/template.php#get_hidden_meta_boxes(). There is a filter, and therefore a chance for a plugin:

<?php # -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
/*
Plugin Name: Enable Custom Fields per Default
Version:     1.0
Required:    3.1
Author:      Thomas Scholz
Author URI:  http://toscho.de
License:     GPL
*/
! defined( 'ABSPATH' ) and exit;
add_filter( 'default_hidden_meta_boxes', 'enable_custom_fields_per_default', 20, 1 );

/**
 * Removes custom fields from the default hidden elements.
 *
 * The original ( wp-admin/includes/template.php#get_hidden_meta_boxes() ):
 * array(
 *      'slugdiv',
 *      'trackbacksdiv',
 *      'postcustom',      <-- we need this
 *      'postexcerpt',
 *      'commentstatusdiv',
 *      'commentsdiv',
 *      'authordiv',
 *      'revisionsdiv'
 * )
 *
 * It has no effect if the user has decided to hide the box.
 * This option is saved in "metaboxhidden_{$screen->id}"
 *
 * @param  array $hidden
 * @return array $hidden
 */
function enable_custom_fields_per_default( $hidden )
{
    foreach ( $hidden as $i => $metabox )
    {
        if ( 'postcustom' == $metabox )
        {
            unset ( $hidden[$i] );
        }
    }
    return $hidden;
}

As you can see, it is quite simple to enable more fields.

Answer 2

Go to edit/create a page or post in wp-admin at the top is a "Screen Options" panel link, here you can enable custom fields for that particular page or post.

The number of metaboxes displayed by default was reduced in 3.1. If you want to change the default for all users you can hook into the default_hidden_meta_boxes filter.