It took me a lot longer than expected to bring this bad boy to market, but the day has finally arrived. Thesis 1.0 is now ready for download, and I think that after five minutes of poking around this new platform, you’ll agree that the WordPress theme world will never be the same.
Click the image to see a huge screenshot of the Thesis options panel!
I’m headed out of town for the weekend, but when I return, I’ll publish a huge launch post detailing all of the new features and changes to the theme. In the meantime, please know that version 1.0 represents a complete overhaul of the core code, and every template file has been improved in some way. Don’t fret, though—your custom styles will still apply, with the only exceptions being a few elements that have been modified (for instance, sidebar headings are now served inside <h3> tags).
In order to hit the ground running, you’ll want to place your existing custom.css file inside the new /custom folder. Other than that, you’ll be able to control just about everything from the all-new Thesis options panel, which boasts a pretty intuitive interface.
Although I’m going to be out of town for the next couple of days, I’ll be active here in the comments and in the forums, and I’ll be anxiously awaiting your feedback on this—dare I say it—revolutionary new platform!
Not yet a Thesis user? Hate having to mess with code to get the results you want? Pick up Thesis 1.0, and experience the options panel that will allow you to unleash all the hidden goodness that WordPress fails to give you by default!
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Wow, Chris. Well done. Will have to give this a whirl shortly.
Like it a lot. Nice work.
Excellent!
Not sure what I’ve done wrong, Chris, but I can’t view the options panel. Getting this error: Call to undefined function: array_diff_key(), with reference to line 185 of options.php
This is occurring on my test site, which is using WP 2.6 alpha (haven’t updated it in about a week), if that matters.
Anyway, in looking over the code: WOW! What an incredible job of coding.
Have a great weekend.
Dang, I always think of a second question after hitting submit. After looking at the large options image you made available via Twitter, I noticed an option of mint and Google Analytics. Great add. My question, though: can I just substitute my pmetrics code into the “mint” box … that is, does thesis really care that it’s mint, or just that it’s js from one of the metrics folks?
Bruce — Crap, I just learned that the
array_diff_keyfunction isn’t supported in PHP 4. I’ve emailed you regarding an immediate fix for this issue.Regarding the Mint and Analytics boxes, you can actually use them to insert any kind of script you want. Dunno why that never occurred to me before… If you need your code in the header, use the Mint box. If you need it in the footer, use the Analytics box.
Hey Chris,
Great to have the new version out. I’m getting this message across my navigation menu:
Warning: implode() [function.implode]: Invalid arguments passed in
/header_functions.phpon line 158.Not able to figure out from what.
thanks.
Daniel — I just added some code that should fix your error. Try downloading the theme again, and if you want, simply overwrite the
header_functions.phpfile that’s located inside your/lib/functionsdirectory.Chris, thank you very much for straightening out my problem. I had forgotten that my test server uses PHP 4 instead of 5 … I didn’t realize anybody used 4 anymore.
Thanks for the fix!
Ohh Chris , thank you for this !!!! not uploaded it yet on any of my sites but I wish I had seen this earlier as ive just devved v0.3 today for a playschool ( http://www.emleyplayschool.co.uk ) and i’m really pleased with it . Its not just finished yet but i’m even more excited about easily transfering the custom file + rotating images over to this new version and getting the same / even better results .
.
Will you be doing a mail shot to your subscribers ?? Or are just keeping those who come here often in the know ??
Keep at it …
G
ps. Oh now you’ve released this will you be updating / having a look at the Neo theme at all ?? Maybe even release it here as a ‘paid for’ theme.
Chris - I’m getting some weird errors when I enable the Multimedia Box and set it to rotate images:
Warning: getimagesize() [function.getimagesize]: URL file-access is disabled in the server configuration in
/multimedia_box_functions.phpon line 74Warning: getimagesize(sample-1.jpg) [function.getimagesize]: failed to open stream: no suitable wrapper could be found in
/multimedia_box_functions.phpon line 74Warning: Division by zero in
multimedia_box_functions.phpon line 139Looking good. Options Panel is great.
Thanks Chris. All better now.
Cool!!!! I’m going to make the upgrade tonight!!!! Thanks, Chris!!
Wow Chris, this looks fabulous! Downloading now and will test as soon as is humanly possible! Enjoy your long weekend, and thanks again! This theme has been worth every cent!
To install am I just putting the new theme 1.0 in the themes folder? When I did this and activated thesis 1.0 my page tabs at the top were missing as well as the rotating image box to the right and my blog title. I changed it back to v. 0.3 but I’m wondering exactly how to do the upgrade.
Thanks!
I would use this theme if it was ONLY for the Big Ass Save Button. Pure genius.
Hi, chris, I have a question: Is it allright that the google analytics code doesn’t appear in the “footer.php”?? I mean, I did put the code in the Theme Options, Will that be enough?
Chris or anyone… how do we change the order of the menu items?
Just downloaded 1.0, but I can’t play around with the theme until my DNS settings kick in.
I’m really anxious to know though… Does 1.0 provide for selection of two or three column layouts?
Thanks for the update Chris, already sounds like a beaut even before uploading it.
I updated to the new Thesis 1.0 - worked quite well overall.
I’m awaiting to see release notes and tutorials; I had to make minor changes to the lib/functions to get some things working as I needed/wanted - but then I noticed a “custom functions” file in the custom folder. I am trying to figure out if I can override functions defined in the lib/functions folder this weekend.
Enjoy the weekend, looking forward to learning my way around Thesis 1.0!
Hi, Chris! Congratulations for your incredible work. At present I’m using drupal for my website, and I’m seriously considering to move towards wordpress and use your theme. I’ll probably migrate and buy your theme today, but I would like to know if there’s some possibility of changing the default English language to Spanish, or if there’s an easy way to translate the theme and use a multilingual version —that was my first idea about my website—. If you’re thinking to translate thesis and you need help with the Spanish version, please, don’t hesitate to contact me, I really would like to make your work available to a wider public.
Regards.
Graham — I should absolutely send an email out to the membership list… Dunno why I didn’t think of that! And regarding Neoclassical, I’ll probably transform that into a paid theme in the future, but I have two other platforms that I’m going to bring to market before that.
Casper — Based on your errors, I think it’s safe to conclude that on your hosting company’s server configuration, URL file access is disabled. This may be a setting that they can change for you at the server level; if it’s not, then I may be able to work with you on a custom fix.
In all honesty, though, a custom fix would be highly inefficient in this case. The reality of the situation is that disabling URL file access is a limiting disservice to users, and I honestly don’t see how some hosting companies think they can pull garbage like that and remain competitive. The mere fact that they’re “holding you back” would be enough for me to jump ship, but then again, I am probably a little more reactive to things like that than most
Oh, and regarding your question about changing the order of menu items, you can only change the order of your Pages in the first section of the nav menu. By assigning a unique numerical value to the Page Order field at the bottom of the Write Page screen in your WordPress dashboard, you can essentially dictate the order in which these pages will appear in your nav menu.
I just looked at your existing nav menu, and the best you could do with the new system is a menu with items in the following order (this assumes the use of a static home page as well):
Because of the way the menu is constructed, the Pages have to come before the category archive links. I realize this is not the “perfect” solution, and believe me—I hate to think that some users will view the current setup as worthless simply because it cannot accommodate their particular case. I’m always working towards a best-fit solution that will accommodate everyone, and hopefully, I’ll be able to offer a completely tweakable navigation menu in a forthcoming release.
In the meantime, you could simply comment out the call to the navigation constructor in
header.php, and you could replace it with an include that contains your navigation links (likenav_menu_items.phpfrom version 0.3):Sasha — That is the natural behavior of 1.0 when you first upload it. In order to get everything working properly, you simply have to visit the Thesis Options page one time (because the visit triggers code that sets up all the default options). So essentially, all you had to do differently was stop by the options page for a second, and you would’ve been good to go. Frankly, I’m a little heartbroken that you weren’t dying to take a look at the new options panel! I kid, I kid
Fausto — That’s definitely not okay. Unless the Analytics code gets rendered in the HTML, there’s no way it can track your stats. I noticed that you were able to get the code into the footer; did it ultimately work via the options panel as it should have?
David — Thesis 1.0 does not contain that option. Originally, I toyed with the idea, but given the relative widths of all the elements in the theme, I think it makes more sense for me to release a completely separate 2-column version. I think it’s worth noting that I have a personal interest in producing a 2-column Thesis, simply because I much prefer 2-column layouts!
Karnatos — I don’t want to get too technical here, but overriding functions would likely require a call to
wp_apply_filtersto be present in the function that you’re trying to override. As it stands now, none of the default functions are equipped with that call, so that’s something you’d need to add yourself. Once you’ve done that, you’ll need to add anadd_filtercall in/lib/launch.phpto initiate your own function. And finally, all of this runaround leads me to one burning question—what did you want to change?Jorge — One of the best features in Thesis 1.0 is the internationalization. I’ve set everything up to use text domains, so in theory, you could set up your own and implement it through a call to:
load_theme_textdomain('thesis');in your
/lib/launch.phpfile.Because Thesis is a paid theme, it would only be possible for me to host separate language versions here on this site. However, I think that you can make text domains “pluggable,” so it’s quite possible that you could simply offer the text domain itself with instructions on how to activate it inside Thesis.
Either way, I’m open to any and all thoughts on the topic. Thesis was meant to be internationalized, and I honestly don’t know the best way to go about all that at the moment. I do know that your enthusiasm to perform a translation is excellent, though, so let’s see what we can do!
Chris,
I found this online and would like to know if you are going to update your template to reflect this information about header tags, or is your theme already designed for this?
chris — The information shared on that site is not, in fact, the best way to organize your markup. Thesis features a more optimized setup that is based on research and techniques that I’ve explored over the last couple of years. If you like, you can read up on some background material in my series, SEO for everybody. Also, to get a better idea of the theory behind Thesis’ markup structure, you should check out the Definitive Guide to Semantic Web Markup for Blogs.
I suppose it’s worth noting that a lot of the work I’ve done in the past on SEO-based markup has been well-cited throughout the Web, and I’m considered somewhat of an authority in the SEO markup space. I’m not offering up this info to boast; but rather, I just want you to rest assured that you’re in good hands with my markup!
Yes, it did work via the option panel, thanks, I get a little bit confused, that’s all.. Sorry… and thanks for answer…
Chris,
I’ll read the information that you have shared.
I miss the author highlight in the comments.
Hi Chris,
Thanks, I just get a bit scared making changes sometimes because I’m so bad at the web stuff but so far your Thesis theme has made things a lot easier for me.
I got all my images and pages back how they were before but the one I’m still having trouble with is the custom backgrounds. In V.03 I was using the grid background. The color is still the same but no grid.
I put the custom images folder in my theme folder like before but when I go to Theme editor, my custom.css is not showing up in the list. I put my previous custom.css file in the custom folder like you indicated.
For fun I moved the custom.css file up one level in the main theme folder and while it did then show up in the Theme editor list, when I tried to make changes, nothing happened.
Any tips?
Thanks so much
Sasha
Chris:
Is is possible to put rotating text in the upper right part of the theme instead of a rotating images?
I just found out about your work a couple days ago. I can’t wait to see what your next release look like.
Thank you very much.
Jon
Chris,
I continued to have a couple of problems on my test site (options would not save), so people with PHP 4 may have some issues. However, I went live with it on my real site (PHP 5), and the transition was very smooth. GREAT WORK!
The STRICT doctype has caused a couple of little minor validation probs to surface … for example, one of my ads uses a “target” in the link, and apparently Strict 1.0 does not like that. I’ll research it some, and may just ultimately just ignore it. There is one validation error though that may be of interest, as it relates to the commenting code:
I got this when validating one of the single post pages. Again, probably not a big deal at all, but thought you would want to know.
You have done one helluva lot of fantastic work on this, dude. Mighty fine coding. Mighty fine. Will take me a while to understand how to hack some of it (like having static, vice rotating images, on a couple of pages), but gives me something to do, eh? And I get to learn in the process. Cool.
Thanks again. Hope you’re enjoying the long weekend.
Chris,
Can I sell this splendid theme as an affiliate?
cheers
Tony
Chris:
I do have one more question for you. My tech knowledge is very limited and I have no knowledge on how to manipulate code. With this in mind, is a guy like me going to have trouble using Thesis. I do not want to make any major changes to the theme, just a couple minor tweaks.
Also, does it come with any “how-to” tutorials and or videos.
Thanks Chris.
Jon
Brilliant. I did not think Thesis could get any better, and it just did. I LOVE the options panel. And like someone else said, it’s worth the money alone to have the “big ass save button.”
Chris,
Jon has actually raised a very good point.
If you included ‘how to’ video tutorials with your theme you would likely skyrocket your earning potential and produce a win/win situation for everyone.
In other words, you would have the ultimate package deal as your themes are SEO friendly and they come with easy to follow instructions for newbies. You could even make some videos to give people instruction on how to locate and market products with your theme.
Perhaps you could have two options. You could have a newbie option which includes all of this stuff and an option for advanced users who already know what to do.
But whatever you choose to do, I think the idea of having video tutorials is a great one, even for advanced users. For example, I know how to locate and market products, but I don’t know how to tweak your theme. So video tutorials covering this would be very helpful to me.
Just some food for thought.
Keishon — My author comments are still highlighted… Has anyone else noticed strange behavior with the author comments?
Sasha — Thesis 1.0 has a totally reorganized file structure, and that’s why your custom background isn’t working at the moment. Follow these steps in order to restore your background (and hopefully gain an understanding of the new file structure):
/customfolder which houses yourcustom.cssfile and a single/imagesfolder. If you like, you can simply upload the entire/custom_imagesfolder to the/customfolder. If you do this, you’ll have 3 items in your/customfolder—one.cssfile and two folders. Add the appropriate CSS for your desired background to yourcustom.cssfile. The definition for the background graphic contains a reference to'custom_images/bg-grid.gif'. Because you’ve now got a/custom_imagesfolder, the original CSS reference will work properly.Now, with all of that said, there’s a cleaner way you can go about this, and this is actually what I would consider to be the preferred method. Simply take all of the graphics files from the
/custom_imagesfolder and move them to/custom/images.Next, change the custom CSS for your background from this:
to this:
Oh, and please keep in mind that my advice here assumes that you haven’t modified the default 1.0 file structure in any way, so make sure you’ve restored everything before trying this out!
Jon — In theory, yes, you can place rotating text in the multimedia box portion of the theme. In practice, however, this may prove difficult and ill-advised, especially since you said you don’t have much experience wrangling code.
Thesis 1.0 comes with 3 different setups for the multimedia box:
The first two are pretty self-explanatory, but the third option, custom code, requires a little more detail. Essentially, you can enter any code you want into the box provided in the options panel, but you must stick to HTML and JavaScript (this is a natural limitation of the setup and not something I’ve imposed).
With the exception of using JavaScript to handle the text “rotation,” you actually cannot achieve the effect you’re after from within the options panel alone. In order to create what you’ve described, you’d have to involve the use of a separate
.phpfile that randomizes whatever custom code you’d like to serve.Of course, reading back over the last couple of paragraphs, it’s clear to me that this is not something you (or any other user, for that matter) are going to be stoked about doing. I think I may have just come up with a way to randomize snippets of code with relative ease, so I will likely explore that for the next release of the theme.
This is one of those things that you’re probably better off waiting on, but regardless, I bet that someone over in the forums can cook up a quick randomizer based on the old (and now deprecated)
rotating_images.phpfile from older Thesis versions.Bruce — Unfortunately, PHP4 is still so widely used that I cannot simply gloss over the details of the problems you experienced on your test server. I think a couple of users have encountered similar issues over in the forums, so I’m now working with them to see if I can cook up some special fixes that will make Thesis 100% PHP4-friendly. Thanks again for keeping an eye out!
Oh, and regarding the validation “error,” XHTML 1.0 strict likes to yell at you when you fail to place an
inputelement inside a block-level tag (like a<p>), even if the element is hidden. I’ll move the offensive, hiddeninput(the audacity!) for the next release.Tony — In keeping with the recently established “The Users are Reading My Mind” theme, you’ve brought up an excellent point. I’m working on a robust affiliate system now, and I hope to have it fully implemented within the next couple of weeks. I’ll definitely be making a big deal of this thing, so just stay tuned to this site for details. Better yet, grab the Thesis feed, and let RSS do the legwork for ya!
Jon — My overarching goal with Thesis is to provide an environment for novice users to run an extremely powerful Website with remarkable precision. The new options panel represents the first big piece of that puzzle. The next piece is for me to build up robust documentation around the new options panel and the amazing things you can do with Thesis, and this is where video tutorials come into play.
Once I’ve finished documenting the new features in 1.0, I’ll begin working on simple screencasts that will serve as instructional tools for users like you. Without question, video is the best medium for relaying precise information on how to use software, and Thesis will not be “complete” until all of the necessary video documentation is in place!
In the meantime, you can find some helpful tips and instruction in the user’s guide. This is where future screencasts and things will be housed, so it may be a good idea to go ahead and familiarize yourself with that area of the site.
Toblerone — I really just wanted to be able to write “and make sure you hit the Big Ass Save Button” in tutorials and comment responses
chris — I think video tutorials are essential for everyone, and I’m going to offer them to all of my customers, regardless of their license. Fortunately, version 1.0 is easy enough to use that I can now construct a bunch of no-nonsense video tutorials that will really help people make the most of the theme.
I would have loved to create a library of videos sooner, but honestly, the theme wasn’t at a point where I thought I could get long-term value from the videos. Since they’re kind of a pain in the butt to produce (I’m a stickler for quality), I decided to wait until I had a platform that was actually worthy of some nice instructional videos. Now that Thesis 1.0 has arrived, however, it’s time to bring on the videos!
Well,
Since you are planning on bringing on the videos I will go ahead and purchase Thesis.
Please do me a favor however, and make a video to show us how to do the custom styles sheet. I don’t know how to set it up.
Thanks!
chris — Thanks for the vote of confidence! If you need help with your
custom.cssfile in the days ahead, please don’t hesitate to let me know! I’ll work with you via the forums to answer any and all questions that you may have.Jon - You said: “Is is possible to put rotating text in the upper right part of the theme instead of a rotating images?”
Make the text you want to rotate into graphics. You would not have to worry about code and you could control the layout much easier.
Chris - Thanks! I’m enjoying the 1.0!
Yancey:
Thanks for the suggestion. I appreciate it.
I just have to learn how to turn text into an image. It sounds like this will be easier than dealing with code.
Jon
Chris,
I checked with my hosting company, Media Temple, regarding the URL file access being disabled and they said:
” It’s a very common error in WordPress. The solution provided by WordPress administrators is then officially don’t hotlink images for this PHP function. Although, I have a feeling it is still possible if you enable the “allow_url_fopen” directive in your php.ini file.”
Is this the best option? I’ve seen a lot of stuff about Fopen being a security risk.
Thanks for the menu tips. Using the old school nav_menu_items.php method works swell since I have category archive pages before Pages in my menu. Looking forward to that “tweakable navigation menu” goodness in the future releases.
Cheers!
Chris: I have the same host and issue as Casper. I also wanted to add that sorting options for the pages would be nice.
Hey Chris, simply amazing! How do I get my header graphic to appear? Everything else is fine but my custom header. Thanks!
Hi there! I love the theme, but I have a big problem with images in the rotator, as you can see here. My host is Media Temple, just in case…
Ok, I solved it! I think it was the same problem that Casper has. It simply works if you remove line 74 and 139, as you can see in my site. Hope this works for you. Anyway, Chris, do you know if this procedure could imply a problem with the stability of the website? All the best.
Yay, Chris. Just what I was waiting for before upgrading to the developer’s license!
Thanks for posting your solution Jorge, now I too have commented out lines 74 and 139 and it appears to be working.
Casper, Colin, Jorge, and Yancey — Removing lines 74 and 139 per Jorge’s suggestion is going to severely limit the image-handling ability of the multimedia box. I worked on this problem last night, and with the help of a couple of users, I was able to code up a smoother solution that does not require direct URL file access.
The new and improved version is available for download, and for those of you who’ve experienced problems with URL file access, the two files of interest to you are:
/lib/admin/options_page.php/lib/function/multimedia_box_functions.phpMiguel — In order to get your header image to appear, you’ll need to do two things. First, you need to move your desired header image from its current location to your new
/custom/imagesfolder. When you were using Thesis 0.3, you had a/headersfolder, and that’s where your header image was located. That folder no longer exists in Thesis 1.0, and basically, all you need to do is move your header image from that location to the new location I specified above.Next, you’ll need to modify your
custom.cssfile to point to the new header image. Try this CSS after you’ve moved the header image, and everything ought to work properly:Lisa — Awesome! I would think people would be knocking down your door to have you customize a Thesis installation for them. I still find myself dropping by Wild Keys every now and then and letting out a smug and content, “Ahhhhhhhhh!”
hey Chris, thanks I’m working on it. How do I expand my content box? Just a little wider, I also wanted to reduce the borders. Thanks!
All hells broke, ” blank!” I need to relax but this site is starting to piss me off! Apart of the learning process.
Hey Chris, can not get my header or borders to work properly ? Thanks for the help!
Miguel — Your new
custom.cssfile, which is located inside the/customfolder, is empty. Place your desired header image in/custom/images; place the definition I gave you above in your newcustom.cssfile; and then everything should work properly.yeah bro, I’ve tried it and sorry to say, still doesn’t work. The theme also lost its customized borders, which is similar to the look of this site. I cannot get the header and borders to show?
oh yes! Got it! Thanks Chris!
hey Chirs, take a look here: http://beyondadiet.com How do I fix the header? Its been cut out a bit at the bottom.
Hi Chris. While we’re beating the header thing into the ground, could you please advise on mine too (on v1.0) ?
I’m trying to install a 938 x 117 header (can alter if necessary but somewhere I thought I read 938 was the right width).
I uploaded the image to custom/images and added this to custom.css:
.custom #header { background: url(’images/BreadtopiaM938wide.jpg’) repeat-x; height: 117px; width: 938px;}
As you can see (breadtopia.com/thesis) it’s sorta close I think. But bottom of image isn’t filling the space I created and the width doesn’t seem to be enough. I messed around with adding some code from the forum thread (on modifying header) to header.php but backed it out as I was just shooting in the dark and messing it up further.
Thanks. I’m close to going live with this. Appreciating your personal attention to all the details and nubes like me.
I forgot to mention I also don’t want the title and description to show.
I just noticed the header isn’t showing up at all in IE, just FF 3.0. Also, to correct what I said above. In FF, the entire height of the image IS showing, but you can see the fit problems.
Miguel — Start by removing the
#logoand#taglinedefinitions from your custom stylesheet; instead, uncheck the first two settings under Display Options in the Thesis options panel to “turn off” those two elements.Next, make sure your custom stylesheet contains the following declaration for your
#headerelement:Eric — Because you’re choosing to use CSS to insert your header graphic, you’ll be best-suited by an image that is 960px wide. Once you’ve cropped an image accordingly, make sure that the
#headerdeclaration in your custom stylesheet looks like this:Finally, go into your Thesis options panel, and then uncheck the first two settings under Display Options. This will remove the title and tagline from the header.
Eric — Also, I noticed that you’d rather not use the Multimedia Box, which is totally fine. However, instead of removing all the images from your
/rotatorfolder, you should simply select “Do Not Show Box” from the Thesis Options panel. There are some subtle coding nuances that come about as a result, and you’ll want to make sure that you have your options set appropriately for this type of situation.Thanks Chris. I resized the image to 960 x 116 and uploaded it to the custom/images folder. Then added this code to custom.css:
.custom #header { height: 116px; background: url(’images/BreadtopiaM960wideBl.jpg’); }
It’s much better but still repeats underneath. Do you have the fix for that?
It shows up in IE now too.
Regarding the image box, I changed to “Do Not Show Box†although I do plan on using it when I figure out what I’m going to put in there. I’m leaning towards the 6 static tiles like some users have done so well.
breadtopia.com/thesis
Eric — I knew I forgot something earlier, but I couldn’t remember what it was… The
#headerdeclaration in your custom stylesheet should look like this (not like what I suggested earlier):Hey Chris, thanks bro. You rock! I’m grateful for your effort and reward for us all. You are extremely appreciated.
Miguel — Anytime! Knowing that you came into this thing with very limited HTML and CSS knowledge but were still able to build a robust, fully-functioning site is a pretty awesome reward in and of itself. You’re a true DIY-er, if I may say so!
Congratulations on Thesis version 1.0 Chris! I particularly like your clear separation of the custom elements. It makes the theme easier to understand.
To modify the Page Order in the navigation menu I use the My Page Order plugin:
My Page Order allows you to set the order of pages through a drag and drop interface. The default method of setting the order page by page is extremely clumsy, especially with a large number of pages.
Andrew — That plugin is the perfect complement to the Thesis nav menu. I’d love to do something similar for the options panel… I’d even considered doing an AJAXy drag-and-drop interface that would allow you to rearrange the elements of the theme. Now that would really be something!
Chris said:
Lisa — Awesome! I would think people would be knocking down your door to have you customize a Thesis installation for them. I still find myself dropping by Wild Keys every now and then and letting out a smug and content, “Ahhhhhhhhh!â€
T’anks. I suspect am having the same trouble you did when you did freelance theme development—lots of interest and not enough hours in the day! Right now, I’m restricting blog mods to current design clients, but hope to be able to open things up in the future.
This theme looks simple but quite cool. Hope a free version of this theme also come out soon. If so, please do let me know. Thanks.
Chris:
Is there a simple way to add an advertising section
Thanks
I am looking at possibly using WP for some micro sites we want to put together rather than our full blown CMS solution.
I came across Thesis and WP ReMix, both of which look very interesting. Can you tell me what Thesis does better and worse than WP ReMix?
Wayne — If I recall properly, you already asked a similar question on a different page of this site. In case you missed it, here’s my response regarding (some of) the advertising options with Thesis 1.0.
Christopher — I don’t know anything about the WP-Remix theme, and even if I did, I’m not in the habit of commenting on competitors’ offerings. I can only speak to the merits of Thesis, which features the most finely-tuned codebase of any theme on the market today. Also, I really believe there’s a huge upside to having pixel-perfect typography on your site, so that’s one of the things I don’t even think about compromising. The Thesis design is based entirely around effective use of typography and whitespace, two things that have immediate and significant effects on your site’s users.
Given its current level of flexibility and the direction it’s heading, Thesis is a great choice for any site. Of course, that doesn’t preclude other themes being effective choices as well, but the bottom line is this—you simply can’t go wrong with Thesis.
Chris Pearson,
I wanted to see if I could get a comparison sort of thing, what Thesis does better and ideally what it doesn’t so I can make a good decision. They both look like excellent solutions, I only recently looked into this market as I primarily have been focusing on our core CMS and our main site and I really don’t see WP as a CMS system, but these two systems look very interesting and looks like they would be perfect for some micro sites I want to put together and don’t want to do a full CMS and I will likely have blogging, so it would be nice to use something like WP.
Both products look really good, but there is no demo that I know of, and no video or good run down of exactly what you gain from either site. There are some features lists on both sites.
I couldn’t find a way to contact support or the author, otherwise I was going to email and ask if there was a good comparison between the two and any other theme that would do something similar so I know what I would be getting.
Christopher — I am support and the author, and you’re actually on the Thesis demo now. Actually getting behind the scenes of a theme is not something that I foresee happening in the near future, simply because that would require access to a WordPress dashboard where the theme is installed. This presents all sorts of concomitant-access and security issues, so that’s why you probably haven’t come across it yet.
Once again, I’m not going to go over a competitor’s product and dissect it in that manner, simply because I consider it poor form. I wouldn’t have bothered to create Thesis unless I felt like every aspect of theme development needed significant improvement, so that’s pretty much the driving force behind my efforts here.
If you want a more in-depth explanation of some of the most beneficial features of the theme, please take a look at this post. Also, be sure to read the testimonials of users, as I think it’s important to gain a very clear understanding of how the community feels about the product (and the people behind it!) before you make a decision.
Chris Pearson,
I ran through that post earlier when I first came across Thesis. But I think I am still missing a lot of the picture. For example, are all your changes SEO friendly, do you add any functionality to handle SEO friendly URL’s and address duplicate content issues (like in the date archives, and tags). If I want to put together 3-10 page micro-sites (likely with blogs) will this offer a significant advantage over WP alone, using dreamweaver, or using another CMS?
A video showing the back end and talking about the key advantages would be a great way to give us a better understanding on how it works and what it does for you.
Christopher — Thesis is, first and foremost, the most precise and SEO-friendly framework available today. WordPress itself handles SEO-friendly URLs, and where WordPress falls short—with archives and tags, for instance—Thesis picks up the slack. Tags, for instance, are not linked by default, and even if you do choose to link them, the resulting links are nofollowed.
Although Thesis includes a page template that allows for easy archive creation, I don’t recommend using it for the very reason you mentioned. If you still want the benefit of archives without the associated page bloat, then I suggest adding your archive pages to your
robots.txtfile.I find it a bit ironic that you are asking about archives and SEO with microsites, simply because archives don’t seem to be a piece of that puzzle. Because WordPress gives you such finite control over posts and pages (and because this is where Thesis excels), using the theme in this capacity would yield maximally efficient results.
Videos are on the horizon, but I’ve still got a lot of work to do before I get there.
Chris Pearson,
I am thinking beyond Micro Sites, but initially I want to build up a few new blogs that use WP rather than our traditional CMS.
The micro-sites will be a combination of blog/site.
I will likely give your theme a try and see how it works out. It isn’t a fortune to get started, thanks again.
Christopher — Cool. I really think you’ll enjoy the level of control Thesis offers and the ease with which you can roll out highly refined sites.
Christopher: Who is going to be maintaining these microsites of yours? If you are, then you should choose a solution that YOU like. If they are going to be edited by clients or a group of contributors, then you have to think about what will be a system they can manage. The dead-easiest is Blogger, but it’s not as customizable as WordPress. If you want the advantage of a robust backend, without the hassle of coding your own CMS or making a really bloated system do backflips so it can scale smaller, then WordPress is a good choice. If you want to see WordPress with lots of different themes on, there is a theme viewer here. If you want to know more about the admin dashboard, there’s info here..
Theme choice is an entirely separate decision. When you evaluate a theme you should be thinking about a visual design that can be modified to express the nature of the site, that is well-coded and stands up to a lot of different browsers and devices, and Thesis is both of those.
I say this as an independent site designer and producer who can code by hand, also uses Dreamweaver, and has gladly paid the paltry sum to acquire a developer’s license for Thesis. The best way to know if something is a good tool for the task is to build something with the tool.
Christopher: Ah, I see while I was composing my last post, you made a decision… Welcome to the Thesis family. I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.
I am very familar with Word Press, although we are moving our dreamweaver site (merely use DW for an editor, not really to build code) to ExpressionEngine. But because our sites are not overly complex and mainly static pages, a blog, and links to additional resources we may just go with Word Press.
I am looking at Thesis mainly for small parallel micro sites, but possible for our closer to home projects as well if it works out well.
I wouldn’t use any other blogging platform other than Word Press, unless I went to a full CMS and that I would use ExpressionEngine exclusively.
I went ahead and bought a developers license, hopefully we make good use of it.
Hi Chris,
I’ve been using your themes (or variations of them) for a long time now, and I’m really thinking Thesis might solve my issues. I run a satirical news site, and as you can see, I’m currently using a very hacked version of three-column Pressrow. I love Pressrow, and I guess I’m just nervous about the switchover, and that I’ll look like everyone else who has Thesis. I know that’s what the customizations are for, but it’s a concern I have. But Thesis has all the features I’m currenly trying to force three-column Pressrow to have, so it’s really starting to be a no-brainer. It looks awesome either way. Really amazing stuff.
Hi Chris,
This is going to sound silly but, few questions:
1. I am a beginner - am I going to able to use Thesis or is it really only for seasoned users
2. My blog will be about Myanmar and human rights issues and the government frequently searches blogs and closes things down. I need to be 100% sure that if I purchase (using my credit card with real name) it can’t in any way be traced to my blog with my fake name for my own security. Is paypal 100% secure or is there a better way to pay you.
3. Will the magazine style set up have rotating images, video etc? Sounds interesting.
Jerome — Judging by the amount of customization you’ve been able to apply to Press Row (which is a far less customizable framework), I think you’ll find Thesis to be a walk in the park. I’m trying to make it so users can do sweeping customizations without touching a bit of code, but no matter what, if you are relatively proficient with CSS, you’ll always be able to bend Thesis to your every whim.
Domenica — Let’s take these in order:
Chris, thanks for getting back to me. Yeah, I actually made the jump last night, and I’m playing with it now. It’s fantastic, in my humble opinion. Plus, I figured with the upcoming magazine version on the horizon, it’s pretty ideally suited to what I want to be able to accomplish.
Thanks.
Can thesis be modified to not use the left column on the homepage for posts and make it more like a traditional website with a blog? So site content would be on the left, recent posts would be in 2nd or 3rd column and 5-10 inner pages would have site static content in left column.
Can some pages become 2 column if desired?
Michael — You can accomplish what you’re after through the use of a static homepage (a WP-native option) and custom page templates. Thesis comes with a few page templates by default, but none of them are set up for a 2-column layout (at least not right now). Despite that, you could code up your own page template and only call one sidebar instead of two, thereby forcing a 2-column layout on any page that uses that particular page template.
Currently, there’s not a robust solution in place to handle the types of modifications you’re talking about. In order to get a highly dynamic, customized layout like that, you’re looking at a fair amount of custom code work. Despite that, I’m working on more flexible solutions that may actually allow you to choose your layouts on a per-page basis (2 or 3 column, for instance). Only time will tell, though, because can’t say for sure whether or not my future solutions allow for things like that to be done on the fly.
Just installed and receiving coding warning on posts and pages (not home):
A bunch of PHP errors that the editor obscured…No idea how to fix - assistance appreciated - Thanks
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