I’m finding that all the WordPress themes I like are rather crappy on the backend. One of the most functional themes I’ve found is the default one, but I’m told time and again that I should not go with that one. Can anyone suggest a good theme, or better yet, a good theme author that I can check out? I’m looking for not only aesthetics, but functionality. I do not want a simple ‘free template’ conversion, I want my cake and want to eat it too… Alternatively, would changing the color schemes on the default templates count as “different� I’m pretty sure I can diddle the CSS enough to come up with a few decent changes.
As the saying goes, you "can't have your cake and eat it". If you need advanced functionality, you will probably either have to customize an existing template, pay someone for the customization, or build a site yourself. It is tough to get a great looking site for free (probably impossible). One way you might want to approach it is to find a template that you like on themes.wordpress.org, go to the theme's author's site, and check out what the author has done with his/her own site. If it looks like what you want, you can ask for a quote on doing something similar. Since, I am in a similar situation as you are, I have so far determined that building the extra functions into my template is probably not worth the money - that is, there is no return-on-investment (ROI). So I am deferring it. Rich
The only way to do that is to download a theme that closely matches what you are looking for and change it. I ran into the same problem, the themes I liked were just not 100% "kick ass", and when I did find one it was in Polish, so no help there. Find the functionality, and change the colors, and header to do what you want. Here is an example: I was looking for a nice 3 column that matched my blogs subject matter, so I took this theme [Tiga], and made it into this theme [ Hacked Tiga], while still giving the creator his "Props" on the footer. After the functionality, it's really all about the color and the header. IMO. and yes, I had to learn it as I went along, to get what I wanted. Once you start tooling around, it's really not that hard. Just back up the original files, until you are positive of the changes. After that, you can literally "Plug in" just about anything to complete all the other functionalities, and options. Many theme creators release under creative commons, and don't mind a little customization as long as you give credit.
Sound advice... I think I'll set up a test WP so I can diddle the templates till I get it how I want it. Though, I'm thinking I'll diddle from the main template outward (as it's a two column I want)...and I just assume not give credit to some half-assed sponsored template. Then again, I may try combining themes, and if I do that, credit would certainly be given where it's due.
Try not to use a sponsored theme. There are hundreds of creative commons themes out there, just Google, "Wordpress themes", you will find a lot, it took me 3 days to go through them all.
YEah sorry, I don't have a link, but checking out the ones that are directly connected to Wordpress, is the best start. Try this one first. http://themes.wordpress.net/ and then all the rest on the first page are all decent resources. That should keep you busy for a while if you go through all of the WordPRess sponsered ones on the wordpress.org site.
This is the link of wordpress theme on which you can download http://bloggerlounge.net/2007/01/16/create-your-own-wordpress-theme/ http://www.kaushalsheth.com/themes http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/05/07/10-fresh-elegant-and-clean-wordpress-themes/
Thanks for the links guys (& gals?) but do you have any specific ones that you could suggest? I've downloaded several dozen that LOOK nice, but thus far only 2 have been worth using, and in the end I really didn't like either. I'm on dialup, and while WP themes are rather small, I'd still just assume not have to download another couple dozen to find something decent. (Though, I do plan on checking the links this weekend)