[theme-reviewers] What are your thoughts on "blank" themes?

[Claude Needham]

I very much like the idea of a blank theme with inline documentation
for the php to guide a developer in how to deal with customization of
the theme.

This warm fuzzy feeling of creating something to truly help a
developer get a foot hold in the door with theme development should be
extended to include the css.

Why not define all of the id and classes needed for the theme. Leave
the definitions empty. But include inline comments in the css
explaining what is going on there too.

You could put in notes about where a particular style definition shows
on the page -- under what circumstances.
You could include notes on "if you change this, be sure to look at
class xxxx to make them compatible, etc.

Thanks to firebug, I've been able to delve into a good part of the css
for themes. But, it sure would be nice to see a well documented
"blank" style sheet with few definitions but plenty of commentary.

A theme is php and css.

If you want to help a theme developer out, covering both aspects is necessary.

By the way, I do not think css devoid of any definitions will be very
nice for the developer or the user. Keep it simple, yes definite. But
it should be functional. Otherwise, how does the newb learn best
practices and get hints on how to properly handle the styling.

The truth is, wordpress is very accessible. It has made it it's
business to be accessible. That means we are getting people using
wordpress that have little or zero preparation and are learning css,
php, javascript, html, and even graphics manipulation on the fly while
trying to get a website to work.

Hence, the idea of a helper theme is great. Just extend it to include
the css. In my opinion. lol.

Regards,
Claude Needham


On Tue, Nov 29, 2011 at 1:14 PM, Chip Bennett <chip at chipbennett.net> wrote:
> The reason I see it as a "niche" or "special use" case is that, 99.99% of
> the time, end users are not going to use a truly "blank" (i.e. NO CSS
> definitions, whatsoever) on a live site, without modification, and such use
> is not the intended purpose of such Themes.
>
> Chip