Dreamscapes Entry Guidelines

[afuna]

These guidelines are obsolete! Do go visit the newer versions of the guidelines instead

dreamscapes is the community for official style submissions, as well as any discussion or process related to official style submissions.

What kinds of entries belong in dreamscapes?

Draft

Draft entries are unfinished stylesheets or layers posted for comment or help.

Tag these with "draft".

Conversion

Conversion entries contain CSS themes which are finished in terms of design, but which need to be converted to use S2 variables. Posting up a conversion entry signals that you want to find someone willing to help convert things to S2.

Tag these with "conversion".

Needs Testing

Entries needing testing are finished themes which you'd like people to look at in different views, or try with different browsers, just to be sure.

Tag these with "needs testing".

Patch

Sometimes your theme needs to override the ordering of HTML or the output of a function in S2 in order to display properly. (For example, wrapping the username and the usericon in a div). Entries tagged with "patch" can contain either requests for such an alteration, or the code to do it.

Tag these with "patch".

Submission

Submissions are finished themes that have been converted to use S2 variables and tested (either on this community or to your own satisfaction elsewhere), and are ready to go live!

Please note, before we can accept a submission to become an official layout, we need your CLA, and that we need to make sure that we have permission to use/distribute any images that come with your layout. See below for more detail about the CLA.

Tag these with "submission".

Misc entries

Besides actual layout/layer submissions, entries that are related to making styles may be posted to dreamscapes. These include calls for collaboration, sharing resources, tutorials, or sharing common issues/useful tips when working with a theme for a layout (for example, techniques to avoid or use with Tabula Rasa).

We'll tag these as necessary.

What do I need to do when submitting a layout or theme?

First step is to send your Contributor License Agreement by email to denise@dwscoalition.org or by mail to Dreamwidth Studios, LCC, PO Box 39608, Baltimore MD, 21212. This is very important. The CLA basically says that you give us permission to use and redistribute your code and your images. It does not give us exclusive rights to any of them. Please remember that no submission from you can be patched or loaded to the site until your CLA is on file!

If your layout or theme has any images, we need to know where they came from so that we can know whether Dreamwidth may use them. All images must be either your own creation that you are willing to release to Dreamwidth for use and distribution as per the CLA, or else licensed appropriately. If you used a stock photo, we need a link to where it came from, so that we can double-check the licensing terms of the site.

Make sure that your layout or theme is compatible with the latest two versions of Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and IE. Compatibility with the latest Opera and with Firefox 3.6.x is also highly desirable.

For accessibility and general readability, all layouts and themes must be fluid, not fixed width, and, as much as possible, be able to accommodate both large and small font sizes. Icons should be the standard icons, though exceptions are possible; if the icon accompanies text, the text should be the standard text. Please test your layout with small screens and large fonts, to make sure it does not break easily for users who have different defaults than your own. Use proportional units such as ems or percentages for non-graphic elements.

If you want to test or tweak your layout or theme a bit more, post it with the needs testing or draft, with any relevant details.

If you have a CSS-only layout is complete and ready to go as-is, post it with the conversion tag, and we'll begin the process of converting it to use S2 variables as necessary (let us know what level of participation works for you in this step! I know that S2 is not everyone's cuppa.)

Then when it's ready post it again as a submission so that we know it's ready to go! (For the submission, especially, tell us what name you want us to credit your layout under).

To post to dreamscapes, use the Post to Community link on the profile. Posting is open to everyone; you do not need to be a member of the community to submit an entry.

Required Metadata

Each entry should be tagged with the base style the layout applies to, the type of entry as above, with "-not filed", and with an ":unclaimed". It should also have this header:

<b>Theme name/layout:</b> your theme's name / layout it applies to <b>Author:</b> name or username you'd like to show up on /customize <b>Layout info:</b> links to layout layer/stylesheet/textfile or a textarea containing the layout (links to the source code are preferrable) <b>Image info:</b> does the layout have images? Are they in the public domain, or are they images you made yourself? <b>Additional info (for layouts):</b> anything else you might want to add, but here are some suggestions -- is the "use layout stylesheet" option enabled? what column types are supported (one-column, two-column, three-column)? are the modules supposed to be movable/do they look good if you move them around?

For example:
Theme name/layout: Tabula Rasa Plain / Tabula Rasa
Author: afuna
Layout info: layout layer
Image info: No images
Additional info: uses the layout stylesheet; supports one- two- three-columns, both left and right; modules look okay even when they've been moved around.
(tagged: submission, ~tabula rasa, -not filed, :unclaimed)

If you're linking to an s2 layer, add these two lines to allow others to view your code, and to easily set up your theme layer for preview:
layerinfo "source_viewable" = 1;
layerinfo "is_public" = 1;

It is also advisable to include links to the source and a preview of anything you submit. There is a entry on how to make a preview of your layout or theme here.

The "-not filed" tag simply indicates that your layout or theme has not been migrated to Dreamwidth's bug tracking system, and makes it easier to keep track of which entries still need attention, and which ones have already been handled. The ":unclaimed" tag indicates that no coder has claimed your layout or theme to patch it. (Once someone has picked it up, we'll change that to a ":claimed")

What do I do with entries I'm not sure belong here?

If your entry doesn't fit into any of the above categories, but you think it fits in this community, please first contact the community administrators before posting!

If you:

• need help with an existing official layout, please submit a support request


• are looking for general style help or resources, please see style_system and stylemakers


• want to share a layout, but can't/don't want to submit it as an official site style, please check out dreamwidthlayouts

Do color themes count as submissions?

Yes! See The Quick and Dirty Guide to Creating Color Themes if you don't know how to create one already. We are always happy to see more themes.

I've submitted my layout/theme, now what? How do I know if it will be accepted? How will I know if it is going to be rejected?

You've submitted your layout, and now... you'll probably wait. You can keep an eye on your submissions tags to see when the "-not filed" tag is removed and :claimed is added. Once your submission is filed, you can see its entry on DW's Bugzilla. Then we all wait for a coder to take on that "bug" and patch your submission! Once it is patched and put in line for the next code push, the entry will be tagged :committed.

Any work that has to be done to ready your layout will add to the time, of course. Conversion to S2, in particular, tends to take longer than taking an already-S2 layout and doing the final bits to make it an official style. Any modifications of the layout, for example, if it needs a bit of polishing to make it fluid width and otherwise fit our guidelines, that may take longer still.

There are only a few things which would outright prevent a layout from being used:

• it is based on a layout that is licensed so that Dreamwidth cannot make use of derived layouts


• it uses stock images that are licensed such that Dreamwidth may not use them

Even if some images can't be used, we'd be happy to accept variants of the original layout with other images or without images. Some good places to look for stock images are listed on the wiki.

If there are other issues, such as the layout not following the guidelines, we'd be happy to work with you on the layout further until they do fit our guidelines. This would happen if the layout were:

• substantially broken, or so as to be unusable in one of the browsers we support (inconsistencies in appearance are all right)


• fixed width


• lacked visual differentiation between visited and unvisited links

If your layout is any of these, we'd be happy to work with you to fix them, or to ask someone to do the fixing (especially if it's an issue with IE, and you don't have access to IE -- as has been the case before!). Just let us know, if you're going to be able to work further on your layout, or if you'd prefer that we try to find someone who can do it for you.

Where do I get started?

This is by no means a comprehensive list, but:

• The Style System Overview can help explain what layers are and walk you through how to make them.


• Visual Design for Styles is a great collection of tips to keep in mind when designing styles, from an experienced designer


• Tabula Rasa is a basic layout layer, designed to be a base for CSS styling


• the core 2 layout layer forms the basis of any official S2 layout. Also, read more about S2 in the S2 documentation, which are old LiveJournal docs we are working on replacing


• Styles and design getting started page on the wiki

Comments

[ninetydegrees]

I'm almost done with another Funky Circles theme (http://900degrees.dreamwidth.org/?s2id=91082) but one issue I have is that the link color for days with entries in the mini-calendar is too light. In the CSS I set days with entries to use the entry background color and the entry border color. It obviously doesn't work when these two colors are two close. Should I submit a fix to add new properties, fix the CSS, etc. in the original layout and live theme or is there anyway to override the CSS for just one theme?

[afuna]

If you want to override the CSS for just one theme, I'd suggest overriding this:

Page::print_default_stylesheets()


And for whether to separate it out for everything or not, hmmm. I guess I'd rather not have to, because of the risk of presenting too many color options.

[ninetydegrees]

Got it! Thanks! I'll also help me with two other themes where I want to change the background color.