George's Technology Blog » Blogging

Skinning Wordpress with Child Themes – More Than Skin Deep

admin — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 01:01:09 +0000

Even though Darren Hoyt talked about it in his Exploring WordPress Frameworks and Child Themes post, I missed the point that you can override more than the CSS file using Child Themes. According to Wordpresss.com's Theme Development article you can go to your parent theme's folder (at /wp-content/themes/yourparenttheme/) and copy any of those template files into your Child Theme's folder and edit it, and that will override the parent theme's file.

Additionally (as of WordPress 2.7), the child theme may contain template files, which can be selected in the admin panel as normal, and will override the parent's template files where those possess the same name.

For example, if you want to edit the header and you are using Thematic (folder = /thematic) and your Child Theme is called My Theme (folder = /mytheme) you can copy /wp-content/themes/thematic/header.php to /wp-content/themes/mytheme/header.php and any edits you make will show up on your blog because Wordpress (as of v2.7) will check for template files in your Child Theme folder before looking for your Parent Theme's template files.

With Wordpress Child Themes you can...

build websites more quickly with more flexibility than "traditional" sites
use Wordpress as a CMS
gives your clients the capability to edit their own sites
more easily develop websites that are HTML and CSS compliant with less work than custom "traditional" sites
re-design, skin or add different functionality to themes you like but are missing "something"
make your own Wordpress theme without starting from scratch

Skinning Wordpress

admin — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 06:50:16 +0000

If you visit tonight or during the next couple of days, you may notice the layout of this blog changing - radically. I'm writing below about skinning and am practicing with Thematic. During this process you will see the blog in customized Thematic one moment and in devart the next. Have fun, I am!

Skinning WordPress, or using Child Themes is something I've just discovered at work, although its been a hot topic for some time now. I've kept a suspicious eye on using blogs to build websites because I didn't want to have to learn how to make a WordPress theme myself to avoid endlessly re-uploading updates after new WordPress releases. In the past if you made customization to a theme, when you upgrade the theme you would lose your work. Or, you had to make sure to keep local copies and upload them after upgrading the theme so your customization would be in tact. WordPress Child Themes does away with that, and two products I've read about help you Skin your WordPress blog... safely.

The first is called Mimbo Pro which carries a price, although Mimbo is a free version. The second is Ian Stewart's Thematic - a WordPress Theme Framework that makes it easy to implement WordPress Child Themes.

GoDaddy File Restore/Rollback

admin — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 04:19:49 +0000

Recently I made a critical error editing one of my blog's files - I forgot to download the file before editing it, then uploaded my changes and it took my entire blog down. Needless to say I was upset with myself because I knew better, but I called GoDaddy hoping they could restore my site or file for me, and hoping it wouldn't cost much or take too much time.

The tech support operator ran me through their procedure on restoring a file or folder using the GoDaddy File Manager. I was able to select the day before I changed the file, and download it, back it up (this time), apply my edits and my blog was down for less than 20 minutes (about 10 minutes of that time was spent running around like a headless chicken while my wife and girls looked at me as if I had just landed on the planet).

So, if you delete a file or folder by accident, forget to download a file before editing it and permanently lose your work, remember GoDaddy's File Restore and get your stuff back. Thanks GoDaddy!