minor default theme customisations

hi there, firstly thanks a bunch for zenphoto, i like it a lot, and especially thanks for including the zenpage plugin functionality!

i wish to make a few small css customisations (particularly the hrule under the header is _glaringly_ bright in the dark theme flavour, under forefox at least) , where / how is the best place to do this for this theme so that my customisations will not be lost on theme upgrades?

afiak zenphoto themes don't have the concept of theme 'inheritance' as with wordpress for example, or 'parent' themes, like with piwigo.. . so how to do this the zenphoto way?

again,
kudos for this great project!

Comments

  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    No, Zenphoto themes don't inherit. The best is actually to make a copy of the theme and modify that. But of course you won't get any changes made (but how should that work since changes might happen everywhere in a theme?).

    If you only do css customisations you could include your custom css file after the original ones to overwrite their settings. But even in that case you will have to add the css call to all theme files and of course take care of that on updates.
  • ok.

    of course found out too that the 'default' theme does not support zenpage... :(

    the default zenpage theme _really_ needs some love. it looks very dated and it doesn't have a dark colour scheme option.

    imho zenphoto would be about 1000% better if it had a good default theme with these 3 qualities:

    1. fully responsive theme
    2. zenpage support
    3. good darker colour scheme option.

    cheers.
  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    The default theme is on purpose without Zenpage support because a lot of people only want the gallery part. Responsivnes is on the list for most standards themes but a bit of work and we are just volunteers with so much time.

    Btw, the default theme has four personalities, two light and two dark ones.

    Well, how about just doing a theme you like to see and contribute it to the community? That's what open source is about. All standard themes are meant as a starting point to adapt and extend to your needs (and btw Zenphoto is bascially the CMS and framework to do your own).

    Alternatively you can sponsor (=hire) me (or someone else of course) to do a theme that fits your needs but you surely know that a good theme is not done in an hour.
  • thnx acrylian, yes, i know how free/open software works, i'm a contibutor on several projects and sole developer of a couple. ;)

    my comments were intended as feedback, not criticism (if you look above a had some very positive things to say too).

    the default zenpage theme really is very dated looking and responsive themes are where it's at now. i'd like to see both these things improved for zenphoto 'cause i think it's a good project and deserves more recognition.

    speaking for myself i'm a programmer not a theme designer and my own free time is already committed.

    cheers.
  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    Sorry, maybe I got you wrong then, it sounded so demanding..;-) We appreciate feedback any time.
    speaking for myself i'm a programmer not a theme designer and my own free time is already committed.

    Of course, a quite usual answer we get if we ask someone to contribute. ALso a reason why I responded a little too harsh.

    Nevertheless I absolutley agree about responsivness. It will happen when it will happen. I also often thought about reworking the Zenpage theme and I even wanted to do more themes. Also our site needs to become responsive, we need to switch the forum softwar and so on. The said time issue. You get the impression.

    Btw, I am coming from design and I never would use any prefdefined theme at all, nor do/did bascially all of my clients. So you probably understand my view of themes being starting points to do your own. You never get them right for all.
  • maybe you could get a cooperation going with the zpskeleton developer on an offical theme?

    i don't know if this is possible, or desired, by all parties, but if i'm gonna spend some time on customising a theme i'll probably start with zpskelton as my basis.

    cheers.
  • oh and btw i think custom themes are nice too, but the advantage of a good 'official' theme is you can rely on the fact that you won't suddenly have some work to do when a new version of the core project is released and something changes...
  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    gjr - the zpskeleton developer - is a very valuable community member and he updates his themes frequently. But we are a very small core team and really try to limit the things we need to officially support and maintain. As you know being envolved in such projects yourself that is a lot of work and we have already a lot to do.

    Skeleton as are Twitter's bootstrap seems a nice framework but also using it is a dependency you need to maintain.

    We are really hestitant to make anyone an official team member because we had very bad experiences with that before. gjr and some others are of course exceptions as they are committed to Zenphoto but have already work to support their own themes. We don't try to force or ask anyone to become an official team member anymore.
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