How do you make a Word Press theme?

Discussion in 'WordPress' started by TheSyndicate, May 15, 2007.

  1. #1
    How do you make a Word Press theme?

    I see there are many people making a new Theme for Word Press here on DP.

    Is there a tutorial you can read to learn how to make them?

    Is it mostly graphic or code? What code just PHP?

    Do they copy another template and just change the pictures?

    I see some template already have Plug in or different coding inside is that difficult?

    Is there a standard template that you start from?

    What does a Template cost to make about?

    Do you need to update the Theme every time WP update?

    Thanks I really appreciate some good answers
     
    TheSyndicate, May 15, 2007 IP
  2. dpjd

    dpjd Peon

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    #2
    There is a pretty good tutorial that I learnt from here:

    http://codex.wordpress.org/Theme_Development

    I think the themes sold on DP vary from being handcoded from the start, to current themes being hacked at and re-sold.
     
    dpjd, May 15, 2007 IP
  3. CountryBoy

    CountryBoy Prominent Member

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    #3
    CountryBoy, May 15, 2007 IP
  4. Pixelrage

    Pixelrage Peon

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    #4
    personally I just use existing themes and redo them until I get the effect I want. I don't have time to re-write the dictionary :D
     
    Pixelrage, May 15, 2007 IP
  5. hmansfield

    hmansfield Guest

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    #5
    Same here. If you get me in the ball park, I can"Hack" the rest until I get the desired results.
    I mean it's all basically the same. 1 column, 2 column, left side, right side.
    What really makes it is the header, the colors, configuring the layout, and the plugin's.

    I took this theme, and made it into this theme, and I'm pretty happy with it :) (Not done "Hacking" it yet though)
     
    hmansfield, May 15, 2007 IP
  6. TheSyndicate

    TheSyndicate Prominent Member

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    #6
    So its ok to take another theme and remake it? Beacuase its no copyright or what?
     
    TheSyndicate, May 15, 2007 IP
  7. CountryBoy

    CountryBoy Prominent Member

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    #7
    Themes are copyrighted just the same as any other creation, so you've got to be careful in case the original designer gets upset.

     
    CountryBoy, May 16, 2007 IP
  8. TheSyndicate

    TheSyndicate Prominent Member

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    #8
    Thats what i mean there must be some open source one that you can take and change from? I mean Hemingway is a good one and then some one made some other popular flower site of it :) But there was no problem are they not all OS?
     
    TheSyndicate, May 16, 2007 IP
  9. mwo_4life

    mwo_4life Peon

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    #9
    I usually use one of the generic ones like Kubrick as a start and write a CSS stylesheet from scratch. No point reinventing the wheel; The underlying PHP is what I want to preserve, as the structure is great.

    I wrote a custom script which ensures my footer links can't be removed without sodding up the whole design. It's a bit mean but I spent hours crafting it, so I deserve the backlinks. If the user won't give me those backlinks, they can chip away at someone else's design.
     
    mwo_4life, May 16, 2007 IP
  10. TheSyndicate

    TheSyndicate Prominent Member

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    #10
    No i think thats cool to keep the link back. Maybe people should slow down and not sell like 5 links but 1 - 3 links i think is ok. Did you write a php script for that? Like to share?
     
    TheSyndicate, May 16, 2007 IP