loxly Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 Instead of calling the themes and stylesheets in every page, why aren't they being called in the header file? Also, what about calling themes the same way you call language files? With all the files related to the look in one folder under languages? Themes are in the next level of osc development, but I see a number of people all working on different ideas and not a concerted effort to work together to make one thing that will work across the board with the least amount of impact on the core files so that the new folks can implement it fairly easily? I can't take either of the new systems and apply them to my stores without totally rebuilding my stores and I am not happy about doing that. I need a theme manager, not another whole store to start customizing again. Don't anybody take offence, I am just wondering what the theory is and why the headers aren't being used. I would rather see the thema contribution that is used in Loaded 5 be improved, rather than people adding more and more differing ways of changing themes. d Quote [no external urls in signatures please, kthanks] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cannuck1964 Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 Hi there, Instead of calling the themes and stylesheets in every page, why aren't they being called in the header file? Well the header file would need to be changed a lot, since it is called in after the <head></head> tags...... Also, what about calling themes the same way you call language files? With all the files related to the look in one folder under languages? I think this is what my system does.....all of the layout pages are contained under one directory....with sub directories holding the layout images, layout boxes etc.....The calling of different layouts is indeed called in a similar fashion to the way languages are set up.... this is only my second attempt at a template system....The first was not quite what I wanted, this one works much better as well it has an admin feature the first lacked......I am sure I will be releasing many more in the future.... Themes are in the next level of osc development, but I see a number of people all working on different ideas and not a concerted effort to work together to make one thing that will work across the board with the least amount of impact on the core files so that the new folks can implement it fairly easily? Well a template system by it's nature will effect all of the top level files. OSC can not use a dynamic template system without changes to the top level files that contain the layout for osc. What I have done is remove all of the core information and placed it into other directories. Thus to add in contrabutions, you need to go to the approprate file and add in what is required for the contribution. This is not as hard as it sounds since once you understand the structure, you will find adding the contribution as easy to perform as they currently are.... Working on different ideas is a great thing....I have used serveral ideas from others, for example, my system uses the thema (colour changes) for each template. Thus each layout will have the ability to have multiple colour/image variations.... I can't take either of the new systems and apply them to my stores without totally rebuilding my stores and I am not happy about doing that. I need a theme manager, not another whole store to start customizing again. Well this is true, but I do not believe that rebuilding your store would be that difficult to achieve. Any contributions you added in would need to be added in again. Then you would need to make up just one layout page for the site. Plug it in and it is finished. If you are worried about having difficulties with the contributions, and you have questions on installing them into my system I would be happy to provide free advice on any changes my system has via this forum..... I would rather see the thema contribution that is used in Loaded 5 be improved, rather than people adding more and more differing ways of changing themes. I think my system is an impovement on the thema system. I have looked at it and well I thought it was too limited it that you could change the looks of the store only so much (colour and image variations). I thought it would be better to have a system where it is required to make up one layout page and any css or box changes then that's it...Finished...I leave it to you to think on changing +30 files verses only one layout file.... cheers... Quote Peter McGrath ----------------------------- See my Profile (click here) for more information and to contact me for professional osCommerce support that includes SEO development, custom development and security implementation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 I was actually working on something kind of based off of the Thema contribution. I found it lacking in a lot of ways. Basically, the look and feel can be handled by four files without any modification to anything else. What I did is take all the stuff between <head> and </head> and put it in a file called headinclude.php. I removed the code for the left column from each file and added it to the bottom of the header. I put the code that calls the right column in the footer.php file. The fourth file is stylesheet.css. Finally, I put all of this in a new directory called "styles" which contains a subdirectory for each different style you want to implement and those contain directories for language dependant images... So the whole layout looks something like: catalog -- includes ---- styles ------ style_a -------- images ----------- english ----------- spanish ----------- german ------ style_b -------- images ----------- english ----------- spanish ----------- german ------ style_c -------- images ----------- english ----------- spanish ----------- german I had it basically working but had to stop working on it and it is definately not worthy for contribution yet, especially since the styles were to be assigned to categories for a multiple store look and OSC doesn't support cascading properties on categories. This was only a stopgap measure though as I would like to implement Smarty templates for the whole system., The only thing putting me off on this is MS3. I want to see how the core team does it and if it is efficient. I have also been busy completely rewriting the admin control panel so that it can work in a variety of settings and allow quick sales entry from phone in order and it can work as a POS. I am also making the control panel look and feel more like a standard desktop application so my partners will feel more at home using it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loxly Posted April 24, 2003 Author Share Posted April 24, 2003 Well this is true, but I do not believe that rebuilding your store would be that difficult to achieve. Any contributions you added in would need to be added in again. Then you would need to make up just one layout page for the site. Plug it in and it is finished. If you are worried about having difficulties with the contributions, and you have questions on installing them into my system I would be happy to provide free advice on any changes my system has via this forum..... That's great for someone just starting out, like Loaded 5 is great with all the things it has, but what about the heavily moded stores? They may not look heavily modded from the outside and it may seem easy to you to drop in contributions, but a lot of the contributions require tweaking to work on a variety of servers or get customized for a particular need. It isn't always easy to just move contributions to a new store. So a theme contribution should be just that, a contribution, not a whole store application. Loaded 5 is a starting point, but you can add every component into an existing store separately. If you look through it you can decide if you need that or a current snapshot. With your theme, (which, by the way, I am NOT criticizing :) , I know it has been a LOT of work, and for some people it will be perfect!) I can't take the pieces and put them in my store. Correct me if I am wrong. So it is start over with your store and the themes, or look on with envy .... Quote [no external urls in signatures please, kthanks] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loxly Posted April 24, 2003 Author Share Posted April 24, 2003 Wayne/Luke Your idea is more along the lines of what I think most folks could use. You could put special graphics related to the boxes etc in there also? I would be interested in looking at what you have if you would like to share. I have been trying to look at all the different ideas and figure out how they work. This is my way of teaching myself how to do things :) I am way better at modifing then I am at creating from scratch. If you may have guessed, I like to brainstorm and you certainly can't do that alone! Quote [no external urls in signatures please, kthanks] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 I am in the process of moving servers right now, but I will see if I can put something up for download next week if that helps. It will probably be based off of Loaded 5 which I made the original modifications on but since then I have switched back to MS1 so I can control what contributions I have and keep detailed records of what they change in what files. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loxly Posted April 24, 2003 Author Share Posted April 24, 2003 That would be great, I have both a snapshot from last week and a Loaded 5 I am working with, with lots of mods :) thus the need for a thema that transcends all individual pages :) Quote [no external urls in signatures please, kthanks] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ian Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 I did someting about a year ago which used a 'nuke' model for theming osC. The system also used a 'nuke' type module system where instead of having individual pages (e.g. product_info.php) etc. everything was called thru default.php. So the link would be default.php?module=product_info&product_id=1 I also used a nuke block system (left/right and center boxes) As the system was closely related to the way nuke works, converting nuke themes to work was reasonably straight forward. Why oh why did I drop it. The main reason was the fact that osC was (and is) changing all of the time. I didn't want the headache of supporting what was a huge fork. I still have the code around somewhere, I'll try and stick it up on a live url sometime. Quote Trust me, I'm an Accountant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cannuck1964 Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 Hi there, The system also used a 'nuke' type module system where instead of having individual pages (e.g. product_info.php) etc. everything was called thru default.php. So the link would be default.php?module=product_info&product_id=1 Hi Ian, long time since we talked, I too started along this road. My first attempt at a template system was doing a similar thing....I found that the java code and the search feature where not working the right way and the swicthing of layouts was something I did not feel comfortable with at the time....I would be interested in this as well maybe just to get some ideas from ..... That's great for someone just starting out, like Loaded 5 is great with all the things it has, but what about the heavily moded stores? They may not look heavily modded from the outside and it may seem easy to you to drop in contributions, but a lot of the contributions require tweaking to work on a variety of servers or get customized for a particular need. It isn't always easy to just move contributions to a new store. So a theme contribution should be just that, a contribution, not a whole store application. Well if you have a fully operational store and do not want to start from scratch, then you can follow the same file structure I have in place for my solution. My solution can be implemented on any osc snapshot/loaded 5. I have found in loaded 5 though, some contributions which use the db tables are not set up like osc and use defines to lable them (ie TABLE_PRODUCTS), but rather use the actual db name (products). this has lead to some difficulties when modifing the code, so I have not been using it either.... Correct me if I am wrong. So it is start over with your store and the themes, or look on with envy .... If you want to make a copy of your store and implement the changes, I would be willing to help you out to make the required changes so it has the same file structure... Basically, the look and feel can be handled by four files without any modification to anything else. What I did is take all the stuff between <head> and </head> and put it in a file called headinclude.php. I removed the code for the left column from each file and added it to the bottom of the header. I put the code that calls the right column in the footer.php file. I too would be interested in this as well, since my system is only a second attempt, I am sure I will be making additional changes to the system, and any new ideas are always welcome... cheers Quote Peter McGrath ----------------------------- See my Profile (click here) for more information and to contact me for professional osCommerce support that includes SEO development, custom development and security implementation Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 This is a very interesting discussion. I spent 4 years working at my last job with an old store system called Minivend. As the company grew and we expanded the websites, theming because one of THE most important aspects of our store design. So now that im starting a new job, building a store platform from the ground up with osC, one of the biggest lackings with the product is the lack of a well defined Theme system. You guys are absolutely right, the last thing you want to be doing is having multiple different copies of the 'catalog' when all you want to do is change the look of the store. I'm used to creating 'sister-stores' which shaer the same database, or brand/category specific stores which run with a filter and a different look, usually off the same database. Or even if you have a completely different product database, you still want to use the same basic osC template scheme. I have been modifying my copy of osC with all of this in mind. If i make changes to osC, I want to just beable to copy them over to all the other stores i have up live without worrying that I need specific header code for this one, or a weird css file for that one. Faucet.com was my last job. It has a sisterstore Faucetoutlet.com. Each of those main stores has multiple brandstores (featured brands). Then there are category filter stores like kitchensinkstore.com or whirlpoolbathstore.com. They all use the same database, with special fields in the database to control which header/footer/sidebar files the pages load up. The 'templates' and filter rules can also be controlled via URL parameters which is very important. I'm glad to hear that osC is adding a theming system in. Until then, well I guess everyone is going to have different ideas. I'm trying to modify the main parts of the store as little as possible so I can easily upgrade features as osC releases them. But i'm still maknig sure that my store-template code is portable enough that I can move it from one site to another without breakign anything. I installed Thema 1.0 by Ferhat Kurt and I really think it could work out well. It adds a database driven control which basically has an id number. Whatever id number I set in the database will load a different theme. I modified this Thema code so that it not only changes the CSS file, but also loads a seperate set of images for the sidebars. I plan to expand this so all the header/footer images themselves are 'theme' specific, as well as all the other images like Checkout or Buy now. So now I can have my one site be theme #1, and it's sister site can be theme #2. I can use the same osC files, and just make the changes in the database, and the /theme/ folders. I might even modify the header files so that I can change the theme on the fly via URL parameters, which has been helpful to me in past projects. It still means migrating from the original osC code though, and until osC releases some sort of unified theming system, i'm not sure theres much we can build on except to do our own custom things. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loxly Posted April 24, 2003 Author Share Posted April 24, 2003 I did someting about a year ago which used a 'nuke' model for theming osC. The system also used a 'nuke' type module system where instead of having individual pages (e.g. product_info.php) etc. everything was called thru default.php. So the link would be default.php?module=product_info&product_id=1 I also used a nuke block system (left/right and center boxes) As the system was closely related to the way nuke works, converting nuke themes to work was reasonably straight forward. Why oh why did I drop it. The main reason was the fact that osC was (and is) changing all of the time. I didn't want the headache of supporting what was a huge fork. I still have the code around somewhere, I'll try and stick it up on a live url sometime. I would love to see it, and I totally agree that a fork is NOT the way to go. But I am intersted in seeing how to get the nuke style blocks to work and see if it can be adapted to the osc boxes system. There are contribs now to turn boxes on and off and to set other options on and off and I would be particularly interested in seeing how these work. I have downloaded one I think, but haven't had a chance to look at it. I would also be interested in seeing a full version of osc with all the cms type mods in it if anyone has put this together. Like Loaded 5 with the faq, newsdesk, etc. Quote [no external urls in signatures please, kthanks] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 24, 2003 Share Posted April 24, 2003 The only problem I see with the 'nuke' type system of calling everything from 'default.php' is that it might have an adverse affect on some search engines. Unless you work in that apache mod which coverts something like: default.php?module=product_info&product_id=1 to: default/modules/product_info/product_id/1.php Or something. In fact, i've seen this done with osC, but i haven't a clue how to enable something like that yet (not to go off topic, but could someone point me in the right direction on that one? I beleive tibetcollection.com does that.) Well, maybe having something set up like that really wouldnt hurt search engine rankings. Someone try it :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
loxly Posted April 24, 2003 Author Share Posted April 24, 2003 Actually nuke sites rank quite high in the search engines now. google loves them :) I don't want to do that type of system anyway, I want to plug something into osc that works with any version without major code revison. It is interesting to hear about waht is being done, what has been tried and what doesn't work at all. Maybe we can even help the team by coming with unique ideas they can incorporate into they system they are preparing. Quote [no external urls in signatures please, kthanks] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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