Introduction to Dreamscapes

[branchandroot]

Welcome to dreamscapes! This community is for people who would like to make and submit new themes. For this round, we are accepting themes based on the Tabula Rasa layout (previously known as core 2 testing) for official use on the site. If you have questions about the process, ask them here. If you need a hand with anything you're working on, let the comm know and hopefully we'll have someone who can help out.

This community is not a general forum for Tabula Rasa or a help comm for issues with journal layouts. If you are having problems with an existing official layout, please open a support request in the "Styles" category.

This community is the place where designers can post themes they are working on for testing and comment by comm members before those themes are submitted officially. People who like to see the very latest thing should watch this comm for new themes to play with. Directions and a template for submitting entries will be forthcoming shortly.

Really Basic Guidelines

0. Remember to fill out a CLA.

1. Themes must be compatible with Safari 3 and up, IE7 and up, and Firefox 3 and up. Compatibility with the latest Opera is highly desirable.

2. Themes must be fluid, not fixed width, and should accommodate both large and small font sizes. Test down to 800x600 screen resolution and up to 20px font at least. Use proportional units such as ems or percentages for non-graphic elements.

3. All images must be either your own creation that you are willing to release to DW for use and distribution as per the CLA or else public domain already.

4. Themes will need to be converted to use (or, if you're used to variables, use from the start) the Core 2 variables for fonts, background images and colors so that users can customize their journals easily through the wizard. Feel free to write your CSS with normal hex colors and image paths for now; a post will be made soon explaining how to replace those with properties in your actual theme.*

* If you are unfamiliar with S2 don't worry about it, tutorials will be coming, and we'll make sure that anyone who has completed the CSS will get help with converting it or find a partner who can work with them.

Briefly, Core 2 has a great many user settable variables added in that we can use to control fonts and colors. For example, the css for the background color of an entry should look like this: .entry { background-color: $*color_entry_background; }, where the value of color_entry_background has been set at the start of your theme. You can find descriptions of these properties on the wiki. If you look at the code of Tabula Rasa, you can see lists of everything available to use in themes.

Remember that you should only use the variables inside the print_stylesheet function of your theme, though! If you try to use those variables in a stylesheet intended for entry in the Custom CSS window, they won't work. More detailed information on how to use these will be coming up in another post, soon.

Again, if you're not used to using variables, don't worry! Just get your CSS working and someone will be available to help convert it.

So take a look at your journal in Tabula Rasa, check out the html, and start your designs!

Comments

[From: foxfirefey]

I should note at this point the two most recent versions of Safari are 4 and 3; recently Apple pushed Safari 4 as a software update.

[From: branchandroot]

Ah, thank you. *shakes head* When I wrote the first draft of this, the latest IE was 7, too. I'm all for pressing ahead, but wow.

[From: foxfirefey]

I knoooow, everything changes so fast!

[From: sophie]

And now, of course, Firefox 3.5 is released...

[From: cesy]

I have just started making a new theme using the_style_kit. Where should I post it? Do I just put the CSS in a new entry in this community, or what?

Also, the post in dw_styles asking for themes implied that there's an existing basic stylesheet for Tabula Rasa. How can I see the CSS for that?

[From: branchandroot]

You'll post it in a new entry to this comm; I'm hoping the guidelines for that can go up soon. The base style sheet can be seen in the html header of any page with TR applied and in the TR code (http://www.dreamwidth.org/customize/advanced/layersource.bml?id=551&fmt=html).

[From: afuna]

Hmmm, so what *are* the guidelines, and who was supposed to be doing them? (Is that something I was supposed to be taking care of?)

AHA, now I remember. The basic guidelines are up on the profile.

[From: branchandroot]

*nods* The basics are up. I believe someone (gossymer?) planned to post a template for submitting things, but I don't think that ever got beyond the "what a good idea, someone should do that" stage.

[From: afuna]

Hmm, that is a good idea, but I couldn't find the entry/comment where it was discussed, so I put up a draft!