Flynn's Paws: My Thoughts, My Gripes

Tag: themes

  • 20090907-Trying Theme

    Sorry, folks! I’m trying yet another free theme here at WordPress.com:

    Solipsus by Tiffany Nguyen (Rikkye)

    A black and brown two-column design with flowers, clouds and a sun.

    Tags: two-columns, fixed-width, dark, rtl-language-support, left-sidebar, widgets, sticky-post

    PROs:

    • Header is closer to the top, unlike theme`Dusk`, which has a header that pushes my content and sidebars too low into the middle of the screen.
    • Instead of dark blue color of the former, this latter is dark brown and black.
    • It has a left sidebar unlike most other themes, which uses right sidebars.
    • It also has flowers, one sun, one cloud and one frowning face.
    • The date/time stamp, along with comments meta, is located underneath POST titles.
    • No meta appears underneath PAGES.
    • This theme features the < hr > element as a flowery design. Neat!

    CONs:

    • It’s dark but not too dark to hurt the eyes with contrasting, brightly-colored fonts.
    • The letters appear too small but editing my paid CSS stylesheet upgrade helps to increase the font-size to 84% (via the `body` element).
    • There is no custom header.
    • There is no navigation bar with drop-down menu feature.
    • There is no tagline: see reason below.

    Since I still wanted to RETAIN the image of Dante’s Satan in Inferno and the brief welcome message to describe what to do with this weblog, I removed a parent`home` page, which had the same greeting as shown on the `text widget` (which is currently located uppermost left hand portion of the sidebar):

    `God’s goal: be sunny life`. (This is my blog’s tagline).

    Having a left sidebars means I could set my `Front page display` to latest posts instead of setting the `Front page` to `Home` and the `Post page` to `Archives`. My purpose is to allow a short introduction when viewing my weblog through the `front page` via a mobile, cellphone.

    The sidebars may change as I continue to tweak the appearance of my IMPERFECT weblog site.

  • 20090906-Tweaked CSS

    Due to technical difficulties with previous themes and the face that I ain’t got NO satisfaction with just ONE theme, I’m back with the free theme here at WordPress.com:

    Dusk by Becca Wei

    A dark blue and grey two-column theme adorned with flowers.

    Tags: dark, fixed-width, two-columns, right-sidebar, widgets, sticky-post, rtl-language-support

    In addition, I’ve tweaked my paid CSS stylesheet upgrade to include the original flowery images:

    • bg.gif – background:##556777 url(‘images/bg.gif’) repeat-x;
    • wrapper.gif – background:##EEEAE8 url(‘images/wrapper.gif’) repeat-y;
    • header.gif – background:# url(‘images/header.gif’) no-repeat;
    • content.gif – background:# url(‘images/content.gif’) no-repeat and
    • sidebar.gif – background:# url(‘images/sidebar.gif’) no-repeat top right;.

    TIP: Add an extra pound sign (#) before the `url` section of each `background` images. This will bring up the original flowery designs without having to upload, copy and paste each one.

  • 20090905-Old Theme

    Well, out of sheer ANGER at TPTB and frustration of unemployment and since no-one reads my most recent post entries and as a result my weblog is predominately page driven, I’m trying a free theme (AGAIN) here at WordPress.com:

    Unsleepable by Ben Gray

    A simple two-column theme that appeals to the monochrome amongst us.

    Tags: two-columns, fixed-width, right-sidebar, white, light, widgets, sticky-post, rtl-language-support

    PROs:

    • Sub-pages listed on the right sidebar for each parent page. Neat!
    • Side-bars disappear when viewing not from the home/front page.
    • Bright pink color for the links for easier clicking.
    • Search bar located towards the top right hand corner of the weblog.
    • Blog-roll links defaults to right sidebar at home/front page.
    • Bottom-bar sports three columns, ideal for displaying Flickr, images.

    CONs:

    • No time/date stamp.
    • No drop-down menu of sub-pages and grand-children, too.
    • Will get bored of this monochrome color sooner or later.

  • 20090905-Trying Theme

    Well, out of sheer ANGER at TPTB and frustration of unemployment and since no-one reads my most recent post entries and as a result my weblog is predominately page driven, I’m trying a free theme (AGAIN) here at WordPress.com:

    Unsleepable by Ben Gray

    A simple two-column theme that appeals to the monochrome amongst us.

    Tags: two-columns, fixed-width, right-sidebar, white, light, widgets, sticky-post, rtl-language-support

    PROs:

    • Sub-pages listed on the right sidebar for each parent page. Neat!
    • Side-bars disappear when viewing not from the home/front page.
    • Bright pink color for the links for easier clicking.
    • Search bar located towards the top right hand corner of the weblog.
    • Blog-roll links defaults to right sidebar at home/front page.
    • Bottom-bar sports three columns, ideal for displaying Flickr, images.

    CONs:

    • No time/date stamp.
    • No drop-down menu of sub-pages and grand-children, too.
    • Will get bored of this monochrome color sooner or later.

  • 20090905-Static Pages

    With my purple-colored theme of Sandbox 0.6.1 by Andy Skelton & Scott Allan Wallick, I changed the static pages to:

    • Front page: Welcome (my LONGEST page sporting seven of Gustave Doré’s illustrations) and
    • Posts page: Archives (formerly Recent Posts).

    Since none really reads my blog from whatever the `Front page displays`, the smarter and MORE patient readers will end up navigating to the `Recent posts` links and click those one by one from the sidebar widget or to the ‘Archives‘ page and view the last 15 most recent posts. Brouhaha!

    So maybe it might be easier to read my passionately written posts via the RSS feed. Subscribe now! Or else, I’ll be rather displeased. Meh!

  • 20090905-Old Theme

    Gosh darnit! Sorry but I’ve changed back to the light purple theme here at WordPress.com:

    Sandbox 0.6.1 by Andy Skelton & Scott Allan Wallick

    A theme with powerful, semantic CSS selectors and the ability to add new skins.

    Tags: white, left-sidebar, theme-options, widgets, two-columns, one-column, three-columns, right-sidebar, flexible-width, microformats, rtl-language-support

    And in order to display both the lengthy sidebar widgets for archives items and orgone-related stuff, the Sandbox Skin is:

    Three-Column Minimalist 1.0 by Scott Allan Wallick

    Minimalist style with left and right-sidebars

  • 20090905-Trying Theme

    Gosh darnit! Sorry but I’ve changed back to the light purple theme here at WordPress.com:

    Sandbox 0.6.1 by Andy Skelton & Scott Allan Wallick

    A theme with powerful, semantic CSS selectors and the ability to add new skins.

    Tags: white, left-sidebar, theme-options, widgets, two-columns, one-column, three-columns, right-sidebar, flexible-width, microformats, rtl-language-support

    And in order to display both the lengthy sidebar widgets for archives items and orgone-related stuff, the Sandbox Skin is:

    Three-Column Minimalist 1.0 by Scott Allan Wallick

    Minimalist style with left and right-sidebars

  • 20090903-Old Theme

    Oh dear God! I’ve done it again! This time I’m trying another free theme here at WordPress.com:

    Almost Spring by Becca Wei

    A light and simple two-column theme graced with greens and oranges.

    Tags: green, two-columns, fixed-width, rtl-language-support, widgets, sticky-post, right-sidebar, white, light

    BUT, instead of using the lime-green and orange color scheme, I found triadic color scheme called ‘Fantasy’. I could have went purple but that means something to TPTB. So I went with pink for flowers and found another color to replace the ‘orange-colored’ links with a green tone for a symbol of leaves within the same ‘Fantasy’ column.

  • 20090903-Trying Theme

    Oh dear God! I’ve done it again! This time I’m trying another free theme here at WordPress.com:

    Almost Spring by Becca Wei

    A light and simple two-column theme graced with greens and oranges.

    Tags: green, two-columns, fixed-width, rtl-language-support, widgets, sticky-post, right-sidebar, white, light

    BUT, instead of using the lime-green and orange color scheme, I found triadic color scheme called ‘Fantasy’. I could have went purple but that means something to TPTB. So I went with pink for flowers and found another color to replace the ‘orange-colored’ links with a green tone for a symbol of leaves within the same ‘Fantasy’ column.

  • 20090902-Trying Theme

    Out of frustration at TPTB and boredom from unemployment, I resurrected a tried and true theme here at WordPress.com:

    Pool by Borja Fernandez

    A blue two column with tabbed page navigation, custom header, and widgets.

    Tags: custom-header, blue, two-columns, rtl-language-support, white, light, right-sidebar, widgets, sticky-post, fixed-width

    PROs:

    It has some of my preferred elements:

    • navigation, menu bar towards the top
    • time/date stamp for posts and NOT necessarily for pages.
    • custom header.
    • a search bar towards the top.
    • automatic highlights of pages in the `page widget` of the sidebar.

    CONs:

    • No tagline.
    • CSS stylesheet in Spanish. Had a difficult time figuring what `noticias` meant.
    • Can’t figure out `.wp-caption, .wp-caption img, .wp-caption p.wp-caption-text`.

    The theme appears stable for two internet browsers and for lower screen resolution at 800 by 600 pixels. But it’s better to view my weblog site at a screen resolution of 1024 by 768 pixels.

  • 20090902-Old Theme

    Out of frustration at TPTB and boredom from unemployment, I resurrected a tried and true theme here at WordPress.com:

    Pool by Borja Fernandez

    A blue two column with tabbed page navigation, custom header, and widgets.

    Tags: custom-header, blue, two-columns, rtl-language-support, white, light, right-sidebar, widgets, sticky-post, fixed-width

    PROs:

    It has some of my preferred elements:

    • navigation, menu bar towards the top
    • time/date stamp for posts and NOT necessarily for pages.
    • custom header.
    • a search bar towards the top.
    • automatic highlights of pages in the `page widget` of the sidebar.

    CONs:

    • No tagline.
    • CSS stylesheet in Spanish. Had a difficult time figuring what `noticias` meant.
    • Can’t figure out `.wp-caption, .wp-caption img, .wp-caption p.wp-caption-text`.

    The theme appears stable for two internet browsers and for lower screen resolution at 800 by 600 pixels. But it’s better to view my weblog site at a screen resolution of 1024 by 768 pixels.

  • 20090902-Trying Theme

    Out of frustration at TPTB and boredom from unemployment, I’m trying out another free theme here at WordPress.com:

    Contempt by Michael Heilemann

    A more professional version of Kubrick, sporting hard lines and 2-columns.

    Tags: blue, custom-header, two-columns, fixed-width, right-sidebar, widgets, sticky-post, white, light, rtl-language-support

    Everything looks okay except the list style type, which looks more like a halo or an open mouth than the normal disc or circle for bullet lists.

    I’ve placed the search box on the very top. If one were to do a word search on `Nigeria`, for example, a message appears on top of this search form:

    You have searched the Flynn`s Blogs blog archives for ‘Nigeria’. If you are unable to find anything in these search results, you can try one of these links.

    It’s got a customer header, a tagline and the navigation, menu bar all towards the top of the weblog. However, it doesn’t sport a nice time stamp on the home or front pages or while on archives mode.

    In order to see the time stamp, which appears as a meta towards the bottom of each post, one must click each post entry. Other themes, like `Day Dream`, `Sapphire` and `Kubrick`, show the time stamp in this manner.