[wp-hackers] Hiding Child's Template Theme

[Chris Jean]

I'm starting to play around with child themes and wondered if it is 
possible to hide the parent or template theme of a child theme in Manage 
Themes.

Looking through the code, it looks like the only way to have a theme 
removed is if it is broken (missing parent theme, missing index.php or 
style.css, etc). Even then, it lists them as broken themes.

My reasoning for wanting to hide the parent theme is simple: I don't 
want a user to activate the parent theme if the child theme was the one 
customized or built for their needs. Looking at almost any information 
about building child themes has a note about not activating the parent 
instead of the child. So, I can't be the only one that sees the listing 
of parent themes problematic.

I'm thinking of building a patch for core that allows for an entry in 
the theme information that tells WordPress to hide the theme from 
activation on Manage Themes. For example:

    Theme Name: Parent Theme
    Theme URI: http://wordpress.org
    Author: Chris
    Author URI: http://site.com
    Version: 1.0
    Description: This is a parent theme and should not be used.
    *Hidden: yes*

Of course, a different option could be used instead of "Hidden:", and 
I'm open to suggestions.

I'm passing this by the list first to see 1) how many other developers 
are interested in my proposal and 2) if any other developers have any 
suggestions or recommendations.

-- 
Chris Jean
http://gaarai.com/
http://wp-roadmap.com/
http://dnsyogi.com/