My update for Paradigm theme

kuzzzma Member

I've been using customized Paradigm theme for my Zenphoto website, but latest ZenPhoto release made it unusable due to some depreciated functions (for example, you could't even access theme options).

I wrote to original author offrench in February with bug report for several issues, got no reply and ended up fixing all of them myself.
Last week I wrote again to get permission to share my update and also got no reply.

So, the theme seems to be abandoned - I've decided to share it on my blog, in case someone else may get a use of it too.

What I did for version 1.2:

  • Replaced depreciated functions
  • Fixed typos
  • Fixed pagination on Gallery page
  • Meta tags: using Image Title for description tag, if no extended image description is available.
  • Removed defunct services from options: Add This, Google+
  • Added support for plugins: Featured Images, Image Markup Fields
  • Option to use logo or text for site title
  • Displaying Popular Tags in sidebar
  • Updated to use Google Analytics GA4

Info:
Paradigm 1.2 page: https://www.blog.private-universe.net/web-and-tech/zenphoto-theme-paradigm/

Contains:

  • download link to the latest version
  • list of supported plugins
  • installation instructions
  • suggested gallery options
  • screenshot
  • changelog
  • ways to contact me with bug reports

My testing demo-site: https://demo.private-universe.net/

Comments

  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    edited June 29

    Great, such updates are always welcome. Technically a theme is GPL v2 or later (or some compatible licence) so legally it should be okay.

    Perhaps consider to put it on GitHub or another open platform which to my knowledge the original author never did.

    The theme demo seems to use Google fonts. If the theme itself does as well, it should be optional since as it is considered a privacy problem at least in the EU and other countries ("phoning home" to Google). Better is to have fonts included locally.

    Technically it can be used but with privacy consent only. Same for GA of course (which seems not be enabled there though).

    (And btw, its "Zenphoto", not "ZenPhoto" ;-))

  • kuzzzma Member
    edited June 29

    I left it at my own site since author never stated his preference for this theme specifically - his photos, for example, exclude derivative works, but this theme uses bootstrap, so some building upon should be allowed?

    I plan to post other themes I'm working on to github, but for that one I've decided to err on the side of caution.

    With Google services - I'll probably just delete this font reference, if someone is reliant on it - they can add it themselves.
    But with Analytics - I'll have to research what notices even have to be made... it seems everyone just leaves it to the owner of the site to make a decision according to their local laws.

  • acrylian Administrator, Developer

    I left it at my own site since author never stated his preference for this theme specifically - his photos, for example, exclude derivative works, but this theme uses bootstrap, so some building upon should be allowed?

    A theme is a derivative and dependent work of Zenphoto as the "mother project" generally so it inherits its licences bec. There might be exceptions for design itself but at least for code itself there should not be a problem. It's handled like this on any even bigger CMS out there. Even the commercial themes for a certain widely used CMS are GPL generally.

    I will tomorrow add a note to the paradigm theme entry that there is an updated fork available.

    Looking forward to more themes :-)

    it seems everyone just leaves it to the owner of the site to make a decision according to their local laws.

    Sure, the site owner is responsible and for GA you need an account so the owner should know what he is doing and nothing is "sneaked" in as it is possible with the fonts.

  • kuzzzma Member

    Thanks!
    I've removed font link from template head section and added note in theme options about Analytics (support for GA4 & local laws)

  • kuzzzma Member
    edited July 5

    Big update with a lot of new options in Paradigm version 1.3:

    • Cleaned up and structured Theme Options.
    • Added options:

      • Control how many News Items are shown on Homepage.
      • Control if Dropdown Menus are shown, separately for Albums, News, Pages.
      • Option to display mix of Albums and various sets of Images on Homepage.
      • Optional Sidebar in Archive.
      • If Print_album_menu is enabled, Album List it’s shown in Sidebar for Contact, Search and Credits pages.
      • Optional Popular Tags in Sidebar.
      • Control how Popular Tags are displayed.
      • Extended “Copyright Notice” field (HTML allowed), displayed on Image and Credits pages.
      • Additional “Homepage Message” field (HTML allowed), to display on Homepage.
      • Option to display “Gallery Description” as tagline under Text Logo in Header.
    • Fixed noindex/nofollow for Tags pages.

    • Favicon in [website root] folder will be linked in the Head section.
    • If you use IMG Logo in Header, it will be automatically included as OpenGraph and Twitter Preview Image for Homepage.
    • If logo not selected: img.png in [website root]/uploaded folder will used.
    • Preview Images for other pages for OpenGraph and Twitter cards either use Default Size for Images in gallery or 800px width.
    • Added glyphicons from Bootstap to Headings for more uniform look.
    • New optional pages: Explore (lists all used Tags) and Sitemap (lists all News Categories, Pages and all Albums).
    • Some code clean-up and updates for mobile presentation.
  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    edited July 5

    It should be noted that the theme probably is not compabile with the html_meta_tags plugin which provides twitter and opengraph elements as well.

  • kuzzzma Member

    It's noted in the Installation notes and recommended options that you have to disable some stuff from list of html_meta_tags,
    I'll check that all duplicate fields are mentioned.

  • acrylian Administrator, Developer
    edited July 5

    Okay, good, I hadn't checked everything. I have (longterm) plans to extend html_meta_tags to be more flexible. But probably not for 1.6.x though.

  • kuzzzma Member
    edited July 5

    Quick update to 1.3a

    • fix getMainSiteURL() (depreciated function) in header, footer and breadcrumbs.
    • fixed breadcrumbs for uniform look on all pages with home icon.
Sign In or Register to comment.