Plogger beta 3 theme: Diffuser
I’m in the process of writing a new theme for Plogger beta 3, called “Diffuser”. It uses the Lucid theme as a foundation, but will validate as XHTML 1.0 Strict (with some editing of the core files; edited files are included). I’m a stickler for cross-browser compatibility, and this theme looks nearly identical in Firefox and IE7.
The fundamental changes are:
- The theme template files are now primarily HTML with some PHP, rather than being entirely written in PHP. This will make it easier for people with basic knowledge of HTML to further customize the theme.
- The width of the list item tag that holds each thumbnail is generated dynamically. The <li> tag is always 8px wider than the thumbnail image. This contributes to the correction of the issue with the Lucid theme under some browsers, wherein the list item’s width would be pushed out by long image captions.
- The compatibility with Internet Explorer 7 has been greatly improved. Among other things, a new float and clear bug in IE 7 has been avoided. The theme is inherently much more stable and less prone to breaking in different browsers.
- The unencoded ampersand error has been fixed to allow W3C validation as XHTML 1.0 Strict. These changes are made in ‘plog-functions.php’, which is included in the download.
I’m working on the following non-critical problems:
- Figure out a satisfactory method for generating <title> tags in index.php.
- Improve the breadcrumb on the picture view pages to use the picture’s title instead of the file name, if the former exists.
The download also contains a text file that gives a detailed explanation of the changes to ‘plog-functions.php’. Note that this download is only for use with Plogger beta 3.
Download the latest version of the Plogger beta 3 Diffuser theme here:
Download the “Diffuser” Plogger beta 3 theme
Looking for something more refined?
I’ve also written a more refined theme, the Plogger beta 3 theme: Softer. It uses some rounded edges and soft gradients, and includes the “sort by” function.
