Brainstorming: What do we "need" template-wise?

Post by **yellowled** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:30 am

d_cee wrote:Good Morning!

Huh? Hm. There's coffee in front of me, so you're probably right ... it's kind of hard to determine whether it's morning with the current wheather over here

Oh, our neighbours are making noise again (renovating their appartment), so yes, it must be early in the day ...

d_cee wrote:I'm not sure about that. Would anybody actually use it? Perhaps if users have the option then they'll find a use for it.

Hm. Is it even a good idea to switch off the header in terms of SEO? However, not everybody likes a footer, so that's probably a good idea.

d_cee wrote:
I have some other theme options in the yl15 template which I find useful: coComment support, adding counter code, adding text to the footer. Do we want any of these in bulletproof?
These all sound useful options.

On the other hand, at least counter code and footer text will really bloat the theme options. Both of them require a textarea in the theme options which makes them pretty huge ... well, I'll simply put it in the next zipfile so you guys can see it in action

d_cee wrote:I also think having a navbar on the left or right at the top (or instead of) the sidebar is a useful option.

In addition to the navbar we already have or as another option for that?

YL

d_cee · Post by **d_cee** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:39 am

Hi

I'm sure it must be morning! I'm only on my 3rd coffee!

YellowLed wrote:
d_cee wrote:I also think having a navbar on the left or right at the top (or instead of) the sidebar is a useful option.
In addition to the navbar we already have or as another option for that?

I was thinking as an option to the one we already have - similar to the way I used it instead of the left sidebar on my SPLAT! theme.

Dave

Post by **yellowled** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:44 am

d_cee wrote:I'm sure it must be morning! I'm only on my 3rd coffee!

Hehe. So am I, but thanks to the timezones I'm closer to lunch break

d_cee wrote:I was thinking as an option to the one we already have - similar to the way I used it instead of the left sidebar on my SPLAT! theme.

I'm at it as we speak, erm, write. I'll probably upload a quick zipfile in the next hour or so which will have that currentpage (that's how I called it instead of active in order not to confuse anybody) class Don came up with and those extra theme options. Abdussammad's xml icon code and the new option for the navbar might take some time to work in.

YL

d_cee · Post by **d_cee** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:52 am

Hi YL

I'd have eaten already in your timezone!

I'll download the zip after lunch when I've finished this bloody corporate site I'm still working on!

Dave

Post by **yellowled** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:53 am

YellowLed wrote:However, not everybody likes a footer, so that's probably a good idea.

No, it's not. That's where I put the extra footer text and the counter code, so this would be pretty confusing. Plus, if somebody doesn't want a footer, they can still edit the index.tpl or hide it using CSS, right?

YL

d_cee · Post by **d_cee** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 11:54 am

YellowLed wrote:
YellowLed wrote:However, not everybody likes a footer, so that's probably a good idea.
No, it's not. That's where I put the extra footer text and the counter code, so this would be pretty confusing. Plus, if somebody doesn't want a footer, they can still edit the index.tpl or hide it using CSS, right?

Exactly display: none; always works for me

Post by **yellowled** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 12:29 pm

Sandbox and zipfile updated.

I've included that currentpage class with simplified css example code:

Code: Select all

/* This is the current page the visitor is viewing */
#sitenav .currentpage a { background: #ddd; }

That should be enough to demonstrate it, no need to include a bg image in my humble opinion. That way, the zipfile is still lean (about 30K).

Theme options now include cocomment support, counter code, and additional text in the footer. I've already used all of them in the sandbox.

Does anybody know how to resize those textareas in the theme options? I'd like them to have less lines.

Edit: In the meantime, I also included the option to have the sitenav in one of the sidebars, which was pretty easy to do.

However, I checked out Abdussamad's xml icon code, and I'm afraid it isn't perfect (which is not his fault). As Don already pointed out, some plugins obviously use a hard coded xml icon, i.e. the freetag (sidebar) plugin. Unfortunately, Abdussamad's code can not fix that

Edit #2: To make it even worse, the freetag sidebar plugin (at least as far as I can see) doesn't provide a .tpl file, which might have been a way out. I guess we'll have to stick with one xml icon or check out the methode Dave suggested earlier ...

YL

d_cee · Post by **d_cee** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 3:03 pm

Hmm

you're very quick today - not enough work to do I'd say

How about this for a suggestion? Use the xml icon as I described in my earlier posting which is an easy way around the problem and also bundle some 'source files' with the template. These could be feed icons, customizable header .psd - and anything else we think would be useful. I've just landed 2 more websites to design and build this lunchtime so I think I'm going to be pretty busy for a few days

Dave

Post by **Don Chambers** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 4:41 pm

I too have links in a sidebar on my "to-do list". Not sure if I will incorporate it or not. I wanted to check out some of the plugins that put links in sidebars to see if it would ultimately be redundant or not. I am already burning my candle at both ends and in the middle, so I should probably focus more on what I already have, rather than introducing something new.

I have an idea for setting some additional variables based on the selection of another. Garvin even suggested the same concept in a PM, so perhaps I should pursue that further. Not sure I like it, but I suppose it is worth investigating.

What is most disturbing is this latest news on the feed icon, especially related to the freetag plugin. If there is no way to override the stated xml icon, that will be a problem. Maybe we can get Garvin to provide a solution? It's not like he has anything better to do, right?

Post by **yellowled** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 7:54 pm

Hi Dave,

d_cee wrote:you're very quick today - not enough work to do I'd say

It's my day off, which is the day I get most of the work done for s9y

Plus, I had the new theme options already in my code drawer (from the yl15 template), and integrating the sitenav into the sidebar was a piece of cake

d_cee wrote:How about this for a suggestion? Use the xml icon as I described in my earlier posting which is an easy way around the problem and also bundle some 'source files' with the template.

Erm, I don't see why we should bundle these if people can get them from feedicons.com?

d_cee wrote: I've just landed 2 more websites to design and build this lunchtime so I think I'm going to be pretty busy for a few days

Well, I suppose we're pretty much stuck anyway unless we can somehow resolve that xml icon thing ...

YL

Post by **yellowled** » Wed Feb 28, 2007 7:58 pm

Owen Stubbs wrote:What is most disturbing is this latest news on the feed icon, especially related to the freetag plugin. If there is no way to override the stated xml icon, that will be a problem.

I think I'll try and figure out how to do .tpl files. As far as I can see (I might be wrong), this wouldn't be a problem if the freetag plugin provided a .tpl file, and I've stumbled upon many plugins which don't in the past week, it's getting annoying. Can't be that hard, right? (Famous last words ...)

Owen Stubbs wrote:Maybe we can get Garvin to provide a solution? It's not like he has anything better to do, right?

Nah. His day has 36 hours or something, he should have some spare time

YL

Post by **Don Chambers** » Thu Mar 01, 2007 3:30 am

YellowLed wrote:Sandbox and zipfile updated.

I've included that currentpage class with simplified css example code:
Code: Select all
/* This is the current page the visitor is viewing */
#sitenav .currentpage a { background: #ddd; }
That should be enough to demonstrate it, no need to include a bg image in my humble opinion. That way, the zipfile is still lean (about 30K).
YL

You missed the revision in {if $template_option.sitenavpos == 'below'}

Ever notice how you spot things in other people's work that you would NEVER catch in your own?

Post by **yellowled** » Thu Mar 01, 2007 1:12 pm

Owen Stubbs wrote:You missed the revision in {if $template_option.sitenavpos == 'below'}

God, I love bughunting

Updated, thanks.

BTW, I just realized I overread something in Dave's last post regarding the xml icon, and I guess I'm gonna give that one (the transparent one) a try first ... however, I'm far away from being a graphics expert, so I might return screaming for help

YL

Post by **yellowled** » Thu Mar 01, 2007 1:59 pm

YellowLed wrote:I guess I'm gonna give that one (the transparent one) a try first ... however, I'm far away from being a graphics expert, so I might return screaming for help

Hohum. I happen to love this

It sure doesn't look perfect, see sandbox, but I'm sure you graphics wizards can whip something up that looks much better than my lame amateur try

(I had to find out how to turn a color into transparent in Gimp first, so don't you dare mocking me!

)

I think this is the best we have so far. Right now, the flaws are: a) the xml icon doesn't look really good due to my lack of ability with Gimp, b) this way, the bg color assigned to images in the sidebar also works for i.e. the powered by image.

YL

d_cee · Post by **d_cee** » Thu Mar 01, 2007 6:32 pm

Hi YL

if you add this to the css it will get rid of the 'powered by' problem.

Code: Select all

div.serendipityPlug img {
background-color: inherit;
}

and I'll send an xml icon to you from home this evening

Dave