single-"custompage" not loading correctly

Hi Kevin, Thanks for the advice! I actually keep "whateverpage.php" at the top of all the pages I'm still developing, so they we're all linking correctly. It turns out my

<?php get_header(); ?>

was missing the initial "<?php" ... of course it was just me having a typo. So my CSS now works perfectly. But for some reason when I go to "single-topics.php" it is still listing all of the "topics" posts. Must be something I'm doing wrong with my loop. I was wondering, does the:

is_single()

function work the same for custom post types as for regular blog posts? If that's not the problem, I'll just rake my code for more typos!

Thanks again for all of your help! (Here and on other forum questions I've asked!) You've really helped save my project! Jenn

Below is my code for my content-topic.php page for reference.

<div class="post">
    <h1><a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>"><?php the_title(); ?></a></h1>

    <div class="info">
    <ul>
        <li>Posted in: <?php the_category(', '); ?></li>
        <li><?php the_time('F j, Y'); ?></li>
    </ul><br>
    </div>
    <div class="excerpt">

        <?php if(is_single()): ?>

            <?php the_field('description'); ?>
            <?php comments_template(); ?>

        <?php else: ?>

            <?php the_field('description'); ?>

        <?php endif; ?>
    </div>
</div>

Also my single-topic.php.

<?php get_header(); ?>

<p>this is the single-topics.php page</p>

<?php 
    $args = array(
        'post_type' => 'topics'
    );
    $the_query = new WP_Query ( $args );
?>

<div class="single">
    <?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( $the_query->have_posts() ) : $the_query->the_post(); ?>

        <?php get_template_part('content', 'topics');?>

    <?php endwhile; else: ?>

        <p>There are no posts or pages here.</p>

    <?endif;?>
</div>
<?php get_footer(); ?>

the reason why your loop fails is because of the rewrite propety i mentioned below normaly you have category-customname and single-customname

also you dont have to reloop for the single-custom post as its going to get the current custop post topic

so basically just do the get_header(); the_post();

Hello, Thanks for the response/ help! I've read your advice, but I don't really understand what it means. I've tried googling it, but I still can't make sense of it. Could you point me in the direction explaining what a rewrite property is? Also, the code you suggested, where would I place that? In my single-topic page? Or my content-topic page? Thanks so much! Jenn

That code goes into your array when you declare a custom post

add_action( 'init', 'mudv_chara_register' );
function mudv_chara_register() {
  $labels = array(
  'name' => _x( 'Characters', 'chara' ),
  'singular_name' => _x( 'Character', 'chara' ),
  'add_new' => _x( 'Add New', 'chara' ),
  'add_new_item' => _x( 'Add New Character', 'chara' ),
  'edit_item' => _x( 'Edit Character', 'chara' ),
  'new_item' => _x( 'New Character', 'chara' ),
  'view_item' => _x( 'View Character', 'chara' ),
  'search_items' => _x( 'Search Characters', 'chara' ),
  'not_found' => _x( 'No characters found', 'chara' ),
  'not_found_in_trash' => _x( 'No characters found in Trash', 'chara' ),
  'parent_item_colon' => _x( 'Parent Character:', 'chara' ),
  'menu_name' => _x( 'Characters', 'chara' ),
);
$args = array(
  'labels' => $labels,
  'hierarchical' => false,
  'supports' => array( 'title', 'editor' ),
  'public' => true,
  'show_ui' => true,
  'show_in_menu' => true,
  'menu_position' => 5,
  'show_in_nav_menus' => true,
  'publicly_queryable' => true,
  'exclude_from_search' => false,
  'has_archive' => true,
  'query_var' => true,
  'can_export' => true,
  'rewrite' => array( 'slug' => 'chara','with_front' => FALSE),
  'capability_type' => 'post'
);
register_post_type( 'chara', $args );
} 

in my example the custom post name is chara basicaly what it does it's forcing wordpress to use yourdomain.com/custompostname/

there's a more complete explication here but its mearly to ensure that your single page works http://wp.tutsplus.com/tutorials/creative-coding/the-rewrite-api-post-types-taxonomies/

then since your doing only single page you don't need to do a <?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( $the_query->have_posts() ) : $the_query->the_post(); ?>

because you have a single page its already going to get the post you want to acess the if while post is mostly used in category pages because it needs to re loop for each post other wise its better to use the-post(); right after get_header ();