how to get this to show up...

Its kind of hard to explain. for example:
say if my website had the same layout for every page, and i had a box on the left hand side with like a poll in it. is there a way i could change the poll when ever i wanted without editing every single page on my site? cheers

 

PHP or SSI would work.

 

PHP:

include('mypoll.php');

Add that to where your poll would be on all of your pages.

 

Or use:

PHP:

<?php require('mypoll.php'); ?>

Which causes an error to occur and stops the page from loading if a poll doesn't exist.
It's usually a good thing to stop a page from loading if it's missing components.

 

it stops the page from processing if the file is not found. im pretty sure you could do

PHP:

function(params) OR die('OH NOES MAI FUNCTN DIDNT WORK');


 

Ignoring your sarcasm, that's exactly what I said.

 

Or just load the poll question and answers from a text file. Easiest updating from your point of view with only a minor hit on performance.